


A Mutant And A Dragon Walk Into A Bar . . .

by GhostxWriter



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Asexual charcter, BAMF Women, Be kind to the author!, Because Pepper is a perfectly valid reason for everything, Complicated Relationships, Crackish? But there will also be angst and serious issues too, Crossdressing, Dragons, Dreki, Everyone Is Poly Because Avengers, F/F, F/M, Female Friendship, First fic in a number of years, Fluff(?) and possibly smut or smut-like features, Gen, I Can't Believe I Wrote This, I am the Sass Master General!, It's Luna's fault!, M/M, Magic, Maybe even some funnies?, Multi, Not Canon Compliant, Polyamory, Possibbly kink?, Possibly crossdressing kink?, Privacy Issues, Probably there will be kink, Sarcasm, Sass, Slow Build, Snark, Soulmarks, Soulmate AU, Tags Subject to Change, Timeline? What Timeline?, Well at least I think I'm funny, What Was I Thinking?, Why Did I Write This?, Yes kinky and ace is possible get over it, badass female characters, because why not?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-06
Updated: 2018-01-04
Packaged: 2018-06-06 17:14:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 42,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6762853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GhostxWriter/pseuds/GhostxWriter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One sassy bitch + another sassy bitch + being bitter about Soulmates + Avengers! = Dear all the gods that ever were, are, and ever will be, what is my life?</p><p>Or alternatively, the story about a pair of intrepid heroines in an AU Soulmate/Soulmark Marvel Universe, where the ladies kick ass and are having none of the Universe's shit today! They snark their way through life, friendship, and adventure, interspersed with important issues of privacy, consent, and the messy things that are relationships and feelings.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. "In fair Verona, where we lay our scene . . ."

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [When a Dragon and a Ghost Get Together](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7373428) by [GhostxWriter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/GhostxWriter/pseuds/GhostxWriter), [Luna Draconis (LunaDraconis)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LunaDraconis/pseuds/Luna%20Draconis). 



> So this came to after a discussion my friend, Luna Draconis, and I had about dreams and plot bunnies, and Soulmate AU's and all sorts of other very good things and well, this is my take on things. If you want to see how Luna writes the story, check her out here: http://archiveofourown.org/works/6745789
> 
> When I say not Canon compliant I meant it, I have rejected your reality and substituted my own!
> 
> Unbeta-ed if you can't tell. Be kind to the author who's writing again for the first time in years . . .
> 
> Oh and if anyone can catch the references I sprinkled throughout this, you get extra brownie points from the intrepid authoress.

_~~Two insomniacs sat in the kitchen~~ . . .  
_

_~~Two twentysomethings slouched~~ . . .  
_

_~~A pair of roommates~~ . . .  
_

_~~A blonde and a brunette~~ . . .  
_

_~~A dragon and a mutant~~ . . .  
_

_~~A Julliard Professor and a hacker~~ . . .  
_

_~~A teacher and a translator~~ . . .  
_

_~~An off Broadway star and a best-selling author~~ . . .  
_

_~~An empath and a telepath~~ . . .  
_

_~~A magic user and a telekinetic~~ . . .  
_

_Two friends . . ._

***

I stared at the blinking cursor and half-finished lines of text and sighed. All the sentences I’d started were true, but none of them felt right. None of these were going to work.

“What are you doing?” Luna asked, settling in behind me with her chin on my shoulder, staring sleepily at my laptop screen.

“My latest novel jumped to the Times Bestsellers list in less than three weeks and the magazines are begging for an interview . . . again.”

“Don’t they know by now you don’t do in person interviews?” _For obvious reasons_ , she mused privately, or at least it would have been private if she didn’t live with a telepath. And the fact that I was listening was rude, _better stop that, damn if I’m slipping I must be tired._

Luna Draconis is my best friend and roommate and has been for a number of years now. She teaches at Julliard by day and stars in off Broadway productions in the evening. She’s also a dragon and magic—totally the normal roommate.

I can’t say I’m much better, honestly. I’m telepathic and telekinetic and a mix of gods only know what else, I’m still figuring it out. As for the rest of the boring details, I’m a translator by day and write bestselling novels under a pseudonym by night.

Oh and I’m a scary good hacker—see, boring as can be.

“Oh they know. They’re desperate so they offered a write in interview. Adds something to my mystique, I guess. They asked about a typical day in my life, so I thought I’d make a mini-story out of it, of you and I, you know? They’d never be able to tell whether I was telling the truth or not. I might just put them off again.”

“Have they asked _the_ question yet, Rin?” Luna asked, finally dragging herself off me, absently flicking her fingers to refill our teacups.

“Sorry?”

“The Soulmate one—as in who are they; is it singular or plural, and have you met her, him, or them yet?”

“Oh, _that_ question. Yes, I’ve deflected and fobbed them off with a non-answer.” I looked up and stared at my friend’s back, taking in her tense shoulders and the scowl she directed at her innocent teacup. 

_Oh, right, damnit_. Luna was a little bitter about the whole Soulmate/Soulmark issue.

She has four, three of which were very peculiar. The only one in English read, “What?” The two on her hips most closely resembled Norse runes and roughly translated (my specialty) also read, “What?” Which only left the one on her neck and down her arm, in binary (which was at least interesting) but that too also read, “What?” hence, Luna’s bitterness—in her mid-twenties, did anyone realize how many false positives she’d gotten?

(But this isn’t her story, its mine, and though she’s a big part of it, I refuse to become a secondary character in my own life!)

But it’s not like I could say anything on the Soulmate front—I’ve got _five_ —count them, five!— and sometimes I have to wonder about the universe—I’m asexual, I figured I’d be lucky to have one romantic partner who wasn’t going to be phased by the fact that sex just wasn’t in my agenda. And the universe thinks that five people were going to be okay with that? I’m left wondering whether the universe fucked up or if I‘m just broken somehow.

But right now it wasn’t about me. I pushed up from my chair at the kitchen island and went over to my friend, laying gentle hands on her shoulders. With a soft squeeze, I murmured, “Don’t worry, we’ll find the assholes and then we’ll have a nice conversation about the definition of the word ‘originality’. And then we’ll kick their asses—or I’ll lecture and you kick, or some permutation thereof. Maybe both?”

“Both?”

“Both.”

“Both is good,” we finished together, myself hiding a smile in Luna’s long blonde hair and the woman in question chuckling weakly.

“That joke’s so old it creaks,” she muttered, leaning back against me.

“It made you laugh though, so I can’t complain.”

The two of us stayed in a companionable embrace for a few long minutes before Luna stepped away with a quiet sigh. I apparently make for a great cuddle partner, which was great for Luna, but I’m not a cuddler, more touch averse than not, so the two of us have learned over the years how to compromise. For me it’s a preference and for someone who matters to me, I’m not going to let my preference stand in the way of a friend’s need and Luna in turn, tried to keep them short unless otherwise asked for.

“Have you been to bed yet?”

I shrugged and grinned self-deprecatingly, “Not yet, eight communiques to translate came in last night and then I wanted to check over some NSA intelligence reports—you know how I get.”

Luna rolled her eyes, “No, we’ve been friends for how many years now, and roommates for how much of that time? Are you on call today too?”

“Yeah, and Thursdays are some of the worst, so going to bed now is pointless. Do you have class today?”

“Just my intermediate class at 11:30. I’ll be back by 3:15. Rehearsal’s cancelled tonight, something about repairs.”

I sent her a knowing look, “Avengers?”

Luna just shrugged. When the Avengers are doing the avenging, they’re pretty good about saving lives—buildings? Not so much.

“Don’t forget we’ve got reservations for that new Indian place at seven, double date with those two really cute food critics,” Luna reminded me, “And don’t do anything illegal while I’m gone!”

“You only mean don’t get caught!” I shot back, “Go teach budding young minds or whatever the hell it is you do!”

Luna merely laughed and flipped me the bird as she crossed the floor of our Manhattan penthouse to get ready for her day.

***

It was half past four when one of my alarms went off. Because of who Luna and I are, me being the hacker, I created a backdoor way into the servers of every government system. Mostly because I was keeping tabs on what was going on and making sure that the two of us, dragon and possible mutant, stayed off the radar. It was also how I kept people from connecting ‘E. Ueno’ the bestselling author and Rin Suero, the multilingual translator and blogger separate.

I had eight tablets floating in the air of the living room so I could swap back and forth between them (no, I haven’t figured out how to code my own hologram console, and I certainly wasn't buying StakTech or God forbid, government tech while I figured it out!), but the one that had been preset to S.H.I.E.L.D. was going off like nothing I’ve ever seen before.

S.H.I.E.L.D. for all that it’s reputation as one of the most secure government agencies in the world, or at least it was before the whole snafu with HYDRA, has holes in its security that you could drive a truck through—they still hadn’t figured out that I’m even in their systems, and believe me, I’ve checked.

Making a grab for the necessary tablet, I started scrolling. My preset screening parameters flagged an encrypted communique between one Agent Phil Coulson and Director Nicholas Fury. Long story very short, the Avengers were fighting some grandiose terrorist organization with tech that rivaled Starkech, and then they vanished.

Yep, that was the word alright: vanished. S.H.I.E.L.D. was scrambling to get a line on them, but they’ve got absolutely nothing. They can’t send teams of regular agents to their last known location—it’d be a suicide mission before wheels up—and all other heroes were unavailable. The Fantastic Four were in outer space somewhere and the X-Men went to ground and were currently unreachable.

S.H.I.E.L.D. was fucked, basically. 

Ten minutes later, my shouted “Take that, bitch!” drew Luna out of her cave, looking at me like I was crazy. (She usually looks at me like that). I tipped my head over the back of the couch and smiled lopsided and upside down at her. “Hey, Lu-na,” I said, drawing out the syllables like a cheap movie effect, “Do you wanna be a vigilante?” Great now, I was trying to sing, I can’t sing for crap.

Luna looked at me and then at the glowing screen of my tablet and then back at me. “Ye-es?” she said, drawing out the word with a suspicious glance.

“Great,” I said as I flipped off the couch. I looked down at myself and huffed in irritation. “Be prepared to beam us out, Scotty in . . . seven minutes.

“Need pants.”


	2. "True is it that we have seen better days"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin and Luna go rescue the Avengers and boy, do they need it. And so the ladies do, with flair and sass all over the place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So here and back again I am (oops, and now I'm mixing fandoms, sorry about that. I didn't mean to make you wait so long, but there were finals, and graduation, and moving, and writer's block in that order. But now I'm back and hopefully I'm going to be better a posting more often.
> 
> There are more references scattered throughout this chapter (some more subtle than others) can you catch them all? Brownie points to those who do!
> 
> And as always, Luna Draconis is also writing a version of this, remember to check her out if you haven't already: http://archiveofourown.org/works/6745789

Of course, being who we are, necessitating pants wasn’t usually a big deal. And this couldn’t have come at a better time? We were in the middle of getting dressed for our double date when S.H.I.E.L.D. went all to pieces. It wasn’t quite five when Luna transported us out of our penthouse to the cover of a copse of trees about a hundred yards from the coordinates I gave her before we left; deep in the heart of the Qinghai province of China. With the third smallest population in all the provinces, it made for an excellent choice base for this terrorist organization based of the principles of yadda, yadda, yadda, boring crap. After a while, it’s all the same, ‘take down the enemy, the enemy is oppressing us, this religion, that religion, they are the enemy, I am your leader listen to me . . .’ and on and on. Terrorists weren't usually the most original of thinkers.

Coincidentally, there being such a small population also meant it was less likely we’d be seen, and we stuck out like a sore thumb. I’m of mixed racial ancestry, Japanese, Spanish, and a little of something else I haven’t been able to pinpoint, so I'm going to pass at first glance. Luna, on the other hand, all blonde hair and pale Irish skin tone; much too memorable. Not to mention how we’re dressed.

When I said we were getting ready, I meant getting ready. We’d already done our hair (and we would need to fix it once this was said and done), we were both rocking shades of scarlet lipstick, and when I said I needed pants, I just meant yoga pants under my robe and my comfy slippers. Luna had flip-flops, but I’m sure we looked ridiculous and irritated.

Luna looked around, “So what are we looking for?” She wasn’t wrong; we were staring at a couple of dilapidated outbuildings and not much else.

“It’s mostly underground, give me a few minutes to hack their security properly and figure out how many we’re up against, and then we can get to it.

“And I know,” I said, cutting Luna off before she could start, eyes already glued to the tablet I pulled from the pocket of my robe, “We’re on a tight schedule, we’ve got to be in and out in under an hour in order to be back in time to finish getting ready, without messing up our hair, mind you, get the car from the valet, and make it to the restaurant at no earlier than five after seven.”

“But of course,” Luna said with a sly smile, “Because a queen is never late. Everyone else is simply early.”

“And this is why we’re friends,” I replied, the hint of a smile playing at the corner of my lips as my fingers flew over the screen, “On a somewhat related note, whose car are we taking: yours or mine? Do you need to drain the batteries, as it were?”

“Mine probably, I’ve been good and taking the subway the last few weeks. Trying to do the normal thing, you know?” I met her gaze and we shared a mocking smile and toss of our heads. Luna and I, we’ve got a thing for fast cars, but we don’t like burning all the excess gas it takes to rev the engines, so we’ve modified our cars. Luna ‘bleeds’ excess magic into her car, a beautiful bright red Lamborghini Centenario LP 770-4 and thus makes it run. I, as the telekinetic, simply make the car, a sleek black Aston Martin One-77, run. If we go out places, whose car we take is simply a matter of who needs to burn off excess energy.

“Oh, this is rich,” I laughed, “I don’t know how they did it but they did. All the Avengers are incapacitated in one form or another.”

Luna sidled up close and peered over my shoulder at my tablet screen where I’ve hacked the security feed and the live footage from the area where they’re holding the Avengers. If the situation weren’t so serious, it’d be laughable (well, it is, regardless of the circumstances, but that’s not the kind of thing you don’t admit to in polite company—good thing that Luna isn’t). It was a room of glass-fronted cells arranged in a circle around the room so that everyone could see each other, and was not exactly a happy sight.

Thor, god of thunder and big, blond, beefcake-ness, and Captain America aka Steven Grant Rogers, he of the heroic jawline and ‘Truth, Justice, and the American Way’ were each locked in cells that were basically made of Vibranium or an alloy thereof. Who the hell supplied them with it is something I’m going to have to find out—Wakanda doesn’t exactly let that slip through its fingers. Somebody was selling Vibranium on the free market—maybe _he’d_ even let me help this time around. But basically, those two were standing in the middle of their cells, glaring into space, and every now and then they’d take a swing at the wall or the glass front, only to get thrown back by the recoil of their own momentum.

The Black Widow aka Natasha Romanov, lone survivor of the Red Room, assassin and spy extraordinaire, was also glaring in the middle of her cell, but unlike the other two lunkheads, she was avoiding touching the walls of her cell like the plague. Specs revealed why: anytime she touched the walls or ceiling of her cell in a bid to escape, something happened in the cell across the way to her best friend and partner, Hawkeye. He’d been gassed twice and electrocuted once, and she'd been forced to watch every minute of it. The Widow couldn’t take any more chances.

Hawkeye himself, aka Clint Barton, he of the fantastic marksmanship and the biceps of a god, was climbing the walls of his cell, literally. Whether he had made any progress in the bid for escape or did so as a byproduct of the gas, was still unclear. But as one of the two non-enhanced, not super soldier, not alien, non-magical members of the team, there’s only so much he could do (even if, given that under any other circumstance, he’d have been able to free himself, also being a spy and assassin extraordinaire).

Iron Man, Tony Stark, was still in his suit, but a high level EMP-pulse put him out of commission, and now the suit was magnetized to the floor. He’d basically been trapped spread-eagle on the floor, and couldn't get up… or out. He was also giving a running commentary on how the last couple of times he’d been in that position had been more fun, which alternatively made his teammates laugh or yell, “Shut up, Tony!” so there was apparently a com system running through the whole place.

Loki, god of mischief and lies, and he of the magical mountain of daddy issues was trussed up in so many chains (a look I thought was good on him, but Luna would disagree, and so would I once I thought about it in something more than aesthetic terms) inscribed with so many anti-magic spells and runes that Luna and I both winced away from the mere image on the screen.

The Hulk, otherwise known as Doctor Bruce Banner was probably the easiest—he was basically high as a goddamn kite, and his cell was continuously being gassed with some kind of weird drug compound that I could barely make heads or tails of. He sat crossed legged in the middle of _his_ cell singing some kind of children’s song in Hindi. Well, at least it _would_ have been a children’s song, if he wasn’t changing the words (I giggled like a madwoman and Luna kept staring at me like I was crazy . . .er . . . again). _I_ thought it was funny.

The Falcon, aka Sam Wilson, he of the intense aerial feats and the chocolate slab abs, was yelling all kinds of colorful insults (all without using a single curse word) at the ceiling, and every now and again kicking the walls of his cell. Luna was practically taking notes over my shoulder. Non-powered, and without the specialized training of Hawkeye and the Black Widow, he obviously felt out of his depth. But honestly, this normal guy, former Air Force and Falcon program notwithstanding, had no business running around with superheroes, and yet he did, and kept up very well if S.H.I.E.L.D.'s debriefing notes were anything to go by.

And then the Winter Soldier, aka James Buchanan Barnes, he of the shining metal arm and former Howling Commando, wasn’t saying a word. He kept pacing his cell like a caged animal, metal arm hanging limp by his side, also a victim of the EMP-pulse which downed Iron Man. His cell was significantly colder than the other cells, and it was obvious he was drifting in and out of flashbacks and memories. Both Luna and I flinched, we don't do it purposely, but as an empath and telepath respectively, sometimes we know things, and we can't always shut it out. 

All in all, they definitely needed our help. A few more swipes of the screen and I was fully into their security system. I stretched out with my mind, accounting for all the minds in the structure to make sure the numbers added up. 

“By the by, are we knocking them out or killing them?”

Between the two of us, Luna’s got more of a conscience than I do, usually so the fact that she only gave me a sideways glance at the question was a testament to how little she’s bothered when I have moral quandaries. “We’re going to knock them out,” she said patiently with just the hint of a patronizing air—she lords the age difference between us over me a lot—“and we’re going to dump them on S.H.I.E.L.D.’s doorstep. Let them deal with the trash.”

I could practically feel the evil grin that crept over my face. “Since we’re going to mess with S.H.I.E.L.D. how do you feel about messing with the Avengers?” Luna’s answering grin was all the answer I needed. “You’ve got your bracelet, I trust?”

“Of course,” she scoffed brandishing her wrist with a flourish. I didn’t make them—hardware is 'not my division’—but we’ve each got a bracelet that I wrote code for that worked like a personal bubble. It stopped us from showing up on cameras and the like. Maybe it made me paranoid, but the anti-mutant movement and then S.H.I.E.L.D.’s watch list weren’t anything to joke about and as long as I could help it, I was going to keep us far away from that whole mess. But considering how many circles I was running around S.H.I.E.L.D., I thought we could afford a little levity.

From my other pocket, I withdrew two closed circuit coms and handed one to Luna. “There are precisely four hundred and eight persons within the compound aside from the nine Avengers. I’d say split them down the middle except seven of those are in the main control room, trying to take back their system, my final destination anyway. So two hundred and one for you—oops, never mind, make that one hundred and ninety-nine for you, one of the science types is three weeks pregnant, twins, how lucky she doesn’t know yet, you’ll have to be careful—and two hundred seven for me—we’ll count off as we go to make sure we don’t miss any. If you can, pile them up so we can quick zap them all to S.H.I.E.L.D. when this is said and done. I’m going to download their mainframe and leave it with the prisoners when we drop them off at S.H.I.E.L.D.—though why we’re doing their work for them, I’ll never know.

“Anyway,” I continued over Luna’s snickering, “You’re to rescue the Avengers though you’re going to have to get them out of that room, there’s some kind of charge or sigil carved into its foundation that’ll prevent you from leaving any way other than physically—I think it’s also keeping Thor from his hammer.” I stopped and Luna started sniggering all over again. Shaking my head, I said, “I’d ask you to forget that, but I definitely walked into that one. Moving right along, after you’ve freed the Avengers, drop them off in Stark’s phallic tribute to his masculinity, come back to help me collect their things. We’re going to gift-wrap them and deliver them back, after I’ve blow this place to smithereens. That’s what’s going to take the longest, honestly, sticking around to make sure it doesn’t turn into a forest fire.”

“Nah, girl, we got 'em beat blindfolded.” Luna said, “If this takes longer than ten minutes, I’ll be surprised.”

“But we’ve already done our hair!”

“Fine. Sixteen minutes it is.” Luna rolled her eyes at me and I laughed as I inputted the last command to decimate the security system in the compound. I slid the tablet back into my pocket and off we went.

***

“Nineteen!”

“Twenty-three!”

“You’re getting slow, Gimli—fifty-seven!”

“Shut up, elf! Sixty-four!”

"I can't hear you counting over the sounds of my winning! Eighty-two!"

"Hey, that's seven in one blow! One hundred and twelve!"

The inhabitants of the compound had no chance. We threw them off their element like nothing else, because, honestly, no one expected to get their ass handed to them by women in bathrobes and fuzzy slippers.

I made it to the main control room just before Luna reached the Avengers holding block and pulled up the feed from the room so I had something to watch while the mainframe downloaded. “You’re good to go, honey,” I said as I began disabling the separate and much more sophisticated security systems for the cells. “I’m watching from here, but be careful. I think even your magic’s going to go wonky with what they’ve got in there.”

“Copy that. Time to go rescue some superheroes.”

There was great loud ‘thump’ and an even louder crash outside the door that had all the Avengers looking up and staring. Then the doors fell in and Luna delicately stepped over the wreckage in her peace sign and smiley face robe. She picked up her head, smiled, and waved. “Good evening, gentlemen and lady. I’ll be your rescuer today.”

And then the morons did it, they all said it.

“What?!”

The only word in the entire English language (or any language for that matter) that could so easily wipe a smile off Luna’s face.

(Except Hawkeye, he'd been looking puzzled and when Luna began signing, "I said, good evening . . ." then I remembered! _Shit, the EMP-pulse must have also knocked out Hawkeye's hearing aids!_ And then he too, signed "What?!" Man, Luna just couldn't catch a break in any language . . . )

“Oh, don’t you start that with me!” she said, with a scowl, still signing. She marched over to each cell in turn and put her hand out, giving me my signal to hit the override and let the Avengers out one by one. Though she did have to physically get in and remove Stark from his suit, which she left on the floor. “We’ve got to be out of this room before I can get us out of here.” Luna didn’t wait, just marched out into the hall. The Widow took over signing duties, so that was one less headache for the dragon.

As the Avengers made their way out the door, all still apparently in shock over being rescued by a strange, crazy woman in a bathrobe, the captain stopped in the doorway, taking in all the unconscious figures that littered the hallway. “What in the world? How many men do you have?”

“I’ve got a girlfriend up in the control room,” Luna replied, smiling once more.

“By the Norns, surely you jest?” the god of thunder boomed, looking around like the confused puppy he was.

“I know,” Luna’s smile turned into a smirk, “it hardly seemed fair. Now then, next stop, Avenger’s Tower.” And the ten of them vanished from sight, Luna’s final words hung in the air, “One ninety-nine to two hundred and seven? Hey, wait a minute, if I’d killed them, I’d have won!”


	3. "Better three hours too soon than a minute late"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now that the Avengers were rescued, it was time play Santa (and spy on S.H.I.E.L.D. what else is new?)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I felt like I had to get this one out relatively quickly as its likely the last chapter of Luna's and my respective fics that are going to be relatively similar. I need the writing practice anyway, so there may be more chapters in quick succession coming this way (maybe, I'm going to try).
> 
> Once again, if you haven't checked Luna's side of things out, I recommend you should do so: http://archiveofourown.org/works/6745789

I shook my head; sometimes Luna really was too much. The mainframe and all other assorted documents had finished downloading—two copies, one for my personal files and one for Pirate Leatherbooty, more formally known as Director Nicholas Fury of S.H.I.E.L.D. 

I stepped over one of the unconscious guards and removed the two flash drives I'd been using and put them in my pocket. Other people brought weapons on a rescue mission, I brought flash drives, the really ugly plastic figurine kind ones that nobody really liked. The one going to S.H.I.E.L.D. looked like a demented Captain America—I then added a note that read to give the flash drive to the Son of Coul once it had gone through official channels. (Well, at very least, _I_ was amused).

I was even more so amused when I heard Luna’s voice on the other line, getting in a parting shot at the Avengers, "On behalf of the Rescue Aid Society and its entire membership of two, I’d like to thank you for joining us on our trial run. We are looking forward to never needing to save your collective ass from a fire ever again. Have a nice evening!"

While I waited for Luna, I decided I better make myself useful and start piling all the unconscious guards and other assorted personnel into one spot so Luna could start zapping them into S.H.I.E.L.D.’s main lobby. Which meant I needed several really big bows . . . _Oh, perfect, those could work_ , I thought, catching sight of the cartridge belts and things the guards had been wearing. I started weaving the mess of leather and metal together as I began walking back towards the main junction of the compound, unconscious bodies hovering along behind me like a trail of zombie ducklings.

Zombie ducklings seemed a little sad though, so I turned them all right side up and made a zombie conga line! (Well, unconscious conga line, they weren't dead . . . yet). Anyhow, after a few minutes, I had several of those massive bows with the thousands of loops, the ones that look a little like flowers, made out of cartridge cases and gun belts, with conga line of knocked out bodies dancing behind me when I stumbled upon a an open door which led to a trophy room of sorts. “Looks like I found the gift shop, Luna. It’d make an excellent rendezvous point. Don’t forget the gift wrap on your way back.”

I took Falcon’s wings off the wall, broke the glass case around the Captain’s shield, and quite by accident ran into Mjolnir which was sitting on the floor. “What happened to you? Couldn’t get through the barrier to the holding cell and came here to find friends?” I muttered to myself and bent down like an idiot to wrap my fingers around the handle. It twitched in my grip and then I could have sworn the thing hissed at me. 

“Okay, okay,” I said, pulling my hand back, “I didn’t mean to offend you.” Because of course, story about the ancient god wielding a hammer of legend wouldn’t be complete if the hammer wasn’t sentient in its own right. “I was hoping you’d let me pick you up so I could get you back to Thor—is that okay?”

I could practically feel Mjolnir grumbling in my head and then a very peculiar set of images/thoughts/feelings that took me a few to sift through and attempt to guess what it (she? he? There’s not a manual for the gendering of sentient hammers!) had ‘said’. 

“Thor can wield you?” Vaguely affirmative response. “Odin can wield you?” Same answer. “Family of Thor can wield you?” Non-committal response and how I could tell that, I haven’t the faintest idea. Looking at the etchings on Mjolnir’s sides, something about it looked familiar to me, but I couldn’t quite place why. “Other persons close to Thor can wield you?” It felt like the thing shrugged at me—it’s a hammer! It doesn’t have shoulders! (And I looked like an idiot, talking to a man’s hammer . . . oh God! Could I scrub that sentence from my brain?! Goddamnit!)

“Since I can almost guarantee that I’m not any of those, no dice. Can I pick you up; move you from place to place though? Because otherwise getting you back to Thor isn’t going to be easy.” That earned me another set of thoughts/images/feelings that seemed to take even longer to decipher. “So if I’d tried to pick you up, before you became sentient, I could have . . . but now that you are, you’re playing favorites?” Affirmative, _smug_ feeling. “You just had to be picky, alright; I guess we’ll figure you out later.” I went back to my dancing ~~zombies~~ , dancing unconscious persons to set the wings and shield down when Luna walked in, also with a trail of bodies behind her. 

She looked between me and my conga line and said, “Now why didn’t I think of that?”

I laughed, that was quintessential Luna. “If you’ve got them all, drop them off at S.H.I.E.L.D. HQ—oh, and don’t forget the bows and the flash drive,” I said, holding both out to her. 

Now she was laughing at me. “Doing their jobs for them—with a bow on top and everything. Perfect!” She was about to start zapping them out when suddenly remembered, “Oh, the gift wrap, right! Here!” and proceeded to pull rolls of it out of nowhere and hand them to me.

“Go on, I’ll get started here, we’ve got a schedule to keep.” Luna nodded and got to work, as did I.

Part prank, part game, and part making a point, we were giftwrapping all the Avenger’s toys and going to deliver them onto their doorstep, probably sometime tonight. Basically, we were going to be little shits. 

I’d wrapped Falcon’s wings, Hawkeye’s bow and quiver, and the Black Widow’s knives when suddenly, Luna started shouting at me, “Rin, look, look, you won’t believe this!”

“Luna, I’m busy, we’re running behind,” I started, turning my head to glance over my shoulder and my eyes went wide. “Holy smokes, you can LIFT it?!”

“Apparently so,” Luna said, her eyes not leaving the legendary hammer in her grip. “He likes me . . . wait, how do I know that?” What else could I do but shrug—what other response is appropriate to finding out the gender of a semi-sentient hammer straight from the realm of mythos? 

“Well, he then, is more or less sentient but we can discuss that at length later—schedule to keep and all that.”

Four and half minutes later, we were sitting out beneath the trees surrounded by a peculiar bunch of brightly wrapped packages, watching ground explode, and flames shoot up from the chasm created by the initial explosion. 

Once more I was grateful for the deserted location of the base, as I'm sure we looked very odd, what with the oddly shaped parcels surrounding us: Falcon's wings, Cap's shield, Iron Man's suit, and Mjolnir were by far the oddest shaped, though Hawkeye's bow and quiver, Loki's helmet, and the Soldier's rifle came in pretty close. Which left the Black Widow's knives and the Hulk's (well, the doc's) glasses the most ordinary ones, and wasn't that an amusing thought?

Since we had to wait for at least another thirteen minutes to make sure we didn’t cause a forest fire or some kind of chain reaction that would put any civilians in danger, I pulled my tablet back out and hacked into S.H.I.E.L.D.’s security footage and started laughing. Luna scooted over to take a look, and then she too began to giggle. I had juxtaposed two different feeds together, one from just a few minutes earlier when Luna had dumped (neatly) assorted piles of bodies—that sounded more morbid than I wanted, so quantities of unconscious persons—in S.H.I.E.L.D.’s lobby area, topped with bows made of bullets and a tiny, brightly colored Captain America flash drive hanging off the wrist of the person at the top of our sleeping pyramid. Watching the ‘Son of Coul’ pick his way over the assorted arms and legs of our present to S.H.I.E.L.D. just to get to that piece of (ugly) Captain America memorabilia made this whole trip worth it—watching all the baby agents in the background pick up their jaws at their superior’s . . . expression of his obsession was funnier than it ought to be. 

And then the other was watching Pirate Leatherbooty yell at the Avengers for getting themselves captured, and then proceeded to have kittens when nobody would tell him how they actually escaped, and subsequently returned home. “If he’s not careful his other eye’s going to pop out, kinda like a Mr. Potatohead doll.”

“What, you slap him upside the head and pop! No more one-eyed pirate look?”

We just looked at each other and kept right on laughing, right up until we heard the faint sounds of a helicopter in the distance. We both looked out and lo and behold, it was a helicopter just coming over the horizon line. “Now where did that come from?” I wondered aloud before I redirected my attention to my tablet, and turned up the volume slightly. The chopper was indeed from some news station—though how they got here so fast I haven’t the faintest idea— and was beginning reports about the explosion that rocked the countryside. (And from where? Considering the complicated relationship between China and the free press, well.) 

“If we were hoping for an opportune moment to play Santa,” Luna said, “I don’t think we could time this any better. Shall I drop their presents off right behind them on our way home?”

“Make it so, Number One.”


	4. "I am wealthy in my friends"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After their daring rescue, Rin and Luna take a vacation where they have all the time in the world to do nothing . . . right?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all, so this is a little of a filler chapter but gives some details and background to both the heroines. I'm not sure I like it much, but we'll see.
> 
> Also, my tags read for possible kink. There will from now on be no probably, kink is mentioned in this chapter and it will likely only get worse (depending on your viewpoint) from here. If that's not your thing, do not read any further. 
> 
> And now, if you're still with me, just so you know, all previous chapters have now been edited, a few new details added, some sentences cleaned up, it shouldn't change the story, but just so you all know.
> 
> Don't forget Luna Draconis' version if you haven't already checked it out: http://archiveofourown.org/works/6745789
> 
> If it hasn't been mentioned before, the author thrives on your comments. Drop me a line sometime, I'll eat it all up.

Luna dropped the Avengers’ ‘presents’ off just behind them after they hung up with Fury (I was perhaps, just a little jealous of those hologram consoles) and turned to watch the news. Timing after all, one of the most important components when you were trying to make a point—we didn’t stick around to watch their reactions, though I imagined they were hilarious. After all, we had dates.

And of course, because Irony has no shortage of love for us, when we showed up at the restaurant to meet our dates, all they wanted to talk about was the Avengers and their connection to an explosion in China.

To say the Chinese government was not happy was an understatement. The Avenger’s being a new sort of privatized, global security and the fact that two of their merry boy band (the Widow’s a little outnumbered) were not from Earth led to a whole slew of peculiar diplomatic issues on the global and intergalactic scale that I didn’t want to touch with ten foot (or maybe twenty million lightyears) long pole. I wouldn’t take that job for anything in the world, my secondary Political Science degree notwithstanding. As Luna loves to say, “Nope!” and flail as she ran away, that was me.

Our dates were cute, the food was amazing, and I’m sure under any other circumstances they would have made great conversationalists. (There was a ‘but’ coming, as there usually was). _But_ , they were both very serious fans of the Avengers—we’re talking like stalk them through the streets if they thought they saw anyone who even vaguely looked like them—or at least their measurements, they’ve used all the media footage available to cross reference for that, since the Avengers by and large don’t go out advertising who they are. We left before dessert, leaving them arguing over who would win in a fight between I don’t even remember who. We paid the check and told them to call if they were ever ready to grow the fuck up.

They still haven’t called; last I heard they were still arguing.

Things were quiet for weeks afterwards in the Queer Penthouse. What else would you call the home of two pan-aesthetic, likely panromantic, cis-gendered women (though I’m riding the line of genderqueer) on the asexual spectrum? With the exception of the fuss the Chinese government was putting up over the whole debacle with the Avengers, everything was weirdly quiet. 

Things were so quiet that I had to make my own excitement when I contacted T’challa the day after our daring rescue. The fire didn’t turn into a forest fire, we made sure of that, but because of the gas and the chemicals and probably due to the magic in and around the compound, and despite every effort, they were forced to let it burn itself out. And then while they were letting everything cool down, but, but before S.H.I.E.L.D. or anyone else could access it; I had to let him know about the Vibranium. While dismayed at the news I conveyed (and more than a little irked by the diplomatic mess he was walking into), T’challa was more than happy to agree when I offered to come for a visit, and since I was going to be there, help him track down his smugglers. 

Which was perfect, because I hated to be around during the last few weeks of the school year, and this gave me an opportunity to be away while all that happened, and then I’d meet Luna at this year’s end of the semester vacation. As a reward for not murdering her students, and for me, well, we’ll say research for my next series, but honestly it’s more just a chance to travel with my friend. This year we were headed to Indonesia, from the last week of May through the end of June, maybe longer if we decided we weren’t done, it wasn’t as if money was an issue. Between my novels and the security systems my blogger personality designed and Luna’s family money (being a dragon and all that) we technically never had to work another day in our lives, but we like what we do, so we weren’t going to change that.

But back to the present, S.H.I.E.L.D. had mostly broken the terrorist ring since we dumped so many of their members in their lobby. Poor, dear, Pirate Leatherbooty was too busy sticking his uninvited nose into the diplomatic mess since it involved the Avengers and he seemed to think that S.H.I.E.L.D. had some proprietary claim on them to bother over much with the who, the how, and the why of the ring’s sudden (unconscious) appearance on their doorstep. He yelled at a dozen agents to fix the obvious security holes and assigned Agent Coulson’s team to track down ‘whoever the motherfuckers were’ who do could do such a thing. But with no faces, no trace evidence, no energy signature, and no confirmation from the Avengers themselves that there even were other parties involved, they were at a standstill. 

We sent the Avengers a very large fruit basket for not telling S.H.I.E.L.D. about us, signed ‘The Rescue Aid Society’ as well as copies of the movies.

I was sincerely tempted to continue to mess with the Director; did you know that when he’s pissed enough, he can actually do the throbbing vein thing on his forehead like the cartoons? I thought it was hilarious. I wouldn’t even had to do much, just sneak into his office and move everything just an inch to the left, just enough for the super paranoid leader of a supposed secret government agency to realize that something was wrong, but not enough for him to necessarily _know_. But I decided to err on the side of caution. In hindsight, rescuing the Avengers in such an ostentatious fashion wasn’t the best move for people who were trying to fly under the radar. No need to wave the cape in front of the bull any more than necessary.

Two weeks after the events in China I left for Wakanda, or as far as my (first class) plane ticket was concerned, for Kenya. T’challa would have someone meet me at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Nairobi, and from there to a private airstrip to travel with a returning ambassador’s party. Then what I had to look forward to was a lazy two and a half weeks all to myself. Interspersed with helping T’challa catch his smugglers, of course. Well, and a few more, ‘personal’ matters. 

***

Luna met me at Ngurah Rai International Airport in Bali the last week of May after my Wakandan furlough. She tucked herself against my side as we grabbed my suitcase and walked out to the waiting taxi. We didn’t say a word the whole ride there, though the driver gave us a peculiar look when she half curled up in my lap for scritches. I swear, dragons are just big cats, or at least this one is. She even swiped at me when we reached the hotel and I had to wake her so we could get out and I could pay the driver.

Upstairs in our suite, the door had barely shut behind me before Luna started in on me. “So how was the trip? Was your boy his usual . . . _accommodating_ self?”

“Luna,” I said gently, the faintest touch of rebuke in my voice as I dropped onto the sofa, “you know I don’t talk out of school.”

“Oh please,” she responded with a snort, sprawling across my lap once more, “he knows we don’t have secrets, you told him that upfront and he was fine with that. I don’t want _all_ the details—I’d be too jealous—but come on, let me live vicariously through you. Spill.”

And by and large, I couldn’t begrudge her at least a few crumbs from my recent activities. T’challa and I had a bit of a thing once, and it has carried over every once in a while. It wasn’t romantic and we didn’t sleep together in any way but the most literal definition of the word. “Yes,” I finally said, “he was. For the entire trip, we was _mine_. Anything I wanted, however I wanted it, because it was my will.” At the memory, something a little dark and warm must have crept into my voice because Luna shivered in response on my lap. My hand shifted from scratches to long, slow strokes from her shoulders, down her spine, and back up. “Whoa, whoa, easy, honey. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean for that to happen.”

“It’s all good,” Luna replied slowly, her voice gone a bit dreamy. She twisted her head and stared up at me through slightly glassy eyes, “I’ve said it before, but you’ve got full permission to float me just about any time you please. Now come on, tell me more.”

“Are you going to fall asleep on me?”

“Probably. Problem?”

“Eh, only some. I’ll wake you in two hours so we can go for food.’

“Food, food is good,” Luna mumbled a little nonsensically as she settled back down in my lap for more scratches. That was probably one of the reasons why our friendship worked the way it did, with both of us on opposite sides of the proverbial slash in the BDSM community, and being friends in handy, because we could scene and it would work, or just even have a moment here or there.

“Speaking of food,” I said, returning to scratching the oversized dragon-cat in my lap, “there’s something very visceral about an actual prince bringing you breakfast in bed. Let me tell you . . .”

***

That might have been how we spent our vacation, amazing food, kitschy touristy things interspaced with treks into the jungles that we could only get to due to our unique abilities, as many festivals as we could get to, fantastic souvenirs, and so on. Except, (there was always an except) three days later, as I was sitting on the balcony writing up a blog post late in the evening, Luna’s voice drifted through the open doors.

“Oh, Gimli?”

My fingers froze. I knew that tone of voice, knew it all too well. I slowly raised my head from the screen. Luna was standing in the middle of the living room, eyes glued to the T.V. I let out a long breath and laid my hands flat against my keyboard. “Yes, Legolas?” I answered, just waiting for the other shoe to drop.

“The Avengers are fighting aliens in Manhattan. I want to go watch! Or help. Maybe both!”

 _THUNK!_ went my head into my laptop.

I’d created a monster.


	5. "Let me embrace thee, sour adversity, for wise men say it is the wisest course."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin and Luna go be goddamn heroes once more. Rin struggles with the choices she's made and the possibility of discovery.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we are another chapter in just about two days, aren't you guys spoiled?
> 
> So there's drama, and action, and BAMFness galore in this chapter--it's also like 3500 words, let me breathe for a bit before you start bugging me for another chapter.
> 
> If you haven't read Luna's version of this, I think you ought to! http://archiveofourown.org/works/6745789
> 
> More references are scattered throughout this chapter, if you can catch them you'll get brownie points!
> 
> The author lives for you comments, please talk to me, tell me the things you like about this! Feed the author's ego!

It shouldn’t have come as a surprise that Luna wanted to get back in on the action. The vigilante thing wasn’t exactly a new thing for us. We used to do it a little back in university, just small time stuff: calling cabs for the girl who needed to get away from a pushy guy, roughing up said guy for trying to take advantage; stopping a few muggings, you know, nothing major. At the time, it was more for fun than anything else, we’d created ‘costumes’ and we were trying out the anti-surveillance bracelets I’d coded. But we hadn’t done it in years, it didn’t align with our plan to keep a low profile, so we’d put the costumes away and by and large, we’d forgotten about it. It became little more than an inside joke, now that we were, to all intents and purposes, productive members of adult society. 

I tried explaining this to her, that we were done, we’d rescued the Avengers for laughs and as a smoke screen. While the focus was on the Avengers, the X-Men, and the Fantastic Four, people like she and I could fly under the radar, that there would be less focus on us. That I wasn’t letting S.H.I.E.L.D. or that entitled prick, Xavier anywhere near us. 

Luna wavered, but the pull was too strong, I could feel it. Once more, it shouldn’t have come as a surprise to me. Luna’s a Dreki, it was in their blood. Dreki warriors have been protectors of humanity, guardians of justice for millennium. All those old statues and paintings of dragons? Yep, her family, as real as anything. Was it any wonder that she rebelled? Ran off to university where, happily enough she ran into me. Out first conversation included her saying, “I’m evil,” to which my was response of “Hi Evil, I’m The Bitch,” and we were sold, we’ve been friends ever since.

Fortunately, as the world started to go to hell in a handbasket, the Avengers were formed. Dreki don’t step in unless things were about ready to get really ugly. (Which should be obvious, I mean, when was the last time you saw a dragon in real life?), but the world was at about that point, and she’d been ready—if a little unwilling—to step up to the plate. But she’d never had to, not on any large scale.

And then we rescued the Avengers. She’d gotten a taste for the adrenaline, taking down the bad guys and riding off into the proverbial sunset while the dramatic music played. If Luna wasn’t my best friend, I’d have gone to ground years and years ago, never poked my head up from the sand, but here I was, in too deep. Story of my life.

No matter how many different scenarios I played out in my head, they all led to the eventual conclusion of discovery. All my years of work to keep our heads down and I blew it in one grandiose gesture, just to make a point. There was no going back from this, there was only forward.

“Rin,” Luna said quietly, stepping out onto the balcony. Dreki were empathic, and I read as null, which made our friendship even more practical, but she was obviously getting some kind of read off me. I turned my head slightly, looking at her through the curtain of my hair. What was there to say—she was going with or without me. Considering the undertones of a D/s relationship in our friendship, I might be able to push for her compliance to my preferences, but that would do irreparable damage to our friendship. I could almost guarantee that she’d go anyway if I chose that disastrous option. 

If I said I wasn’t going, or couldn’t go, Luna would understand. Being on S.H.I.E.L.D.’s radar was akin to being on a terrorist watch list, and I don’t trust S.H.I.E.L.D. to be the proverbial guardian of the world, staring at all of us who were different like we’re ticking time bombs about to go off. Or worse, dragged off for experimentation or forced into work ‘for the good of the world’, without any freedom or choice in the matter—very few things terrified me as much as the very possibility as the aforementioned. But that left me with an impossible choice: go or stay. To leave Luna to fend for herself and still likely be discovered anyway; staring at my friend, still standing there, practically vibrating out of her skin with her eagerness, yet still waiting for me, hoping that I’ll stand by as I have so many times before—what choice was there? We’ve been through too much for me to say I was done; running away wasn’t an option any more. Maybe it never was.

“If this is to end in fire, we shall all burn together,” I muttered to myself as I rose from my seat.

“What was that?” Luna asked distractedly. My rising was all the confirmation needed and so she was racing around to get the ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign and what not so our room wouldn’t be bothered while we were back in Manhattan.

“Nothing, darling. Let’s go; we’ll need to get out the old costumes before we hang out with superheroes.”

My last thought before Luna took us back was, _Please don’t let us be discovered._.

***

Ten minutes later, we popped up on a Manhattan rooftop and were nearly skewered via an arrow. Each. (Damn, that man’s reaction time, I wish there was a way to properly describe the appreciative noise that I would have made under any other circumstances). Each of us stopped our respective arrow, Luna used magic and actually caught hers physically, the showoff, I had to content myself with stopping mine midair, about three inches from my throat. And because sarcasm was my (well, _our_ ) native tongue, what came out of my mouth was, “Oops, sorry, birdboy, didn’t realize this perch was taken. Exit rooftop nest left.” And then in sync, Luna and I threw ourselves over the edge and vanished from sight.

We reappeared about four blocks down on a different and thankfully empty rooftop, and started giggling like maniacs. That was so quintessentially us, either our timing was perfect or oh so wrong. We must have given poor Hawkeye quite the shock, the look on his face as we appeared, sassed, and then disappeared. We’re both dressed in head to toe black, from the leather of our boots to the body armor to the cowl-mask combination on our faces and hair. The masks were reminiscent of the mask the Phantom of the Opera wore, just larger, the only bit of our faces showing was a cutout running from just in line with one earlobe, just below the comm implant, to the bridge of our noses where it then cut down our faces, bisecting our lips where it rejoined with the covering over our necks. Less than a quarter of our faces were visible and the poor guy must have thought we were with the aliens they were fighting.

Which wasn’t an entirely inaccurate assessment we soon learned as one such creature, basically a black-shelled humanoid looking thing dangling down from the extremely large spider-thing as a head crawled over the surface of the building across the street. “The hell . . .?” Luna said, peering over the rooftop at the infestation of creatures crawling all over Lower Manhattan. 

Everywhere we looked, it was chaos; hundreds of spider things at least fifteen feet tall crawling over buildings, webs made of some kind of acid were hanging everywhere, melting through cars and buildings—from where we were we couldn’t see what kind of damage those things could do to people, but honestly, I’m pretty sure we didn’t want to know—and some kind of translucent ‘ship’ if you could call it that, dominated the horizon. The crunching of metal and the booms of thunder filled the air as Thor and the Hulk kept trying to bring down the ship, more or less ineffectually. That left the Iron Dude and Falcon to patrol the skies, repulsors, explosions, and lasers, oh my! 

From our rooftop we could see the glint of the Winter Soldier’s arm and the quickly moving speck that was Hawkeye sniping as many of the creatures as they could and the occasional flash of green as Loki’s magic did its thing. That left Captain America and the Black Widow on the ground, trying to both fight and coordinate an evacuation of the people in the nearby buildings towards the police perimeter more than four more blocks down from where we were. Loki and Falcon kept dropping in to help them out, but they had their own responsibilities. 

It was no longer a laughing matter and Luna and I both knew it. “They’ll never make it,” Luna said quietly, staring down at the madness below.

“Well, if help should conveniently, oh, I don’t know, fall from the sky, they’ll be alright,” I replied, and the look that Luna shot me should have stung, so much incredulity and shock packed into the couple square inches of her face I could see. She assumed I’d had second thoughts about stepping in. “Don’t look at me like that,” I muttered uncomfortably, “I live here too, if the Avengers can’t stop them, then our home’s right in the line of fire.”

A smirk slowly grew over Luna’s face, “Sure, whatever you need to tell yourself to sleep at night.”

“I don’t sleep at night, that’s the point,” I said, turning away from my friend’s unwavering scrutiny. “The biggest problems I can see right now are the evacuation and those acid webs. They’re not leaving much safe room for the people to run too. The webs need to either be burnt or dissolved; I can’t tell what they’re made of, maybe even something as simple as water would work. The structural integrity of at least twenty buildings depends on that, because if they fall . . . catastrophe. Sweep the buildings for people and get them out of there, looks like the perimeter has enclosed at least a twelve block radius, then the webs, and obviously blast any spiders that get in your way. Can you do it?”

“Easily,” Luna said, her eyes starting to glow even underneath the mask at the prospect, “What are you going to be doing?”

“Can’t you feel it? They’re basically insects with a hive mentality, but they’ve got a primitive sort of telepathic communication going on—I’m going right to the top to break the queen.”

“Awww, Raven, why do you get to do all the fun stuff?”

“Because, my dear Smaug, _you_ are the guardian of humanity, not me. Humanity is there, go guard it.” Luna was glaring at me beneath her mask. “And,” I added with just a hint of jealousy, “I _can’t_ do what you do. I can’t be the hero they need, if you’ll forgive the cliché. What I’m about to do is going to go against everything we stand for when it comes to consent and to privacy and to free will and choice . . . I’m about to dance with the devil in the pale moonlight.”

Luna looked up at the cloudless 11:00AM sky and back at me. “Raven, you sure you don’t need glasses? It’s not even noon.”

“I was trying to make a point!” I shot back.

“I know what you were trying to say, but as it’s a stupid ass thing to say, I’ve elected to ignore it. Now go on, let’s go save the day . . . again. Watch your six!”

That was Luna for you, she’d never let me be properly serious and have my melancholy moments. I shook my head and responded, “You too. Remember you don’t have my permission to die! Now time to catch a ride.” I smiled with all the confidence I didn’t feel as Luna sputtered, stuck between indignation and laughter, and raced across the rooftop and jumped on the back of a conveniently located spider. Stretching out my mind, I found the mind of the creature such as it was, and with shocking ease, I crushed it under my heel and bent it to my will. With lumbering steps, it slowly turned and began crawling across the buildings towards the ship.

***

I had to change rides three times because either the overgrown Tin Can or Mr. Boom-Boom kept killing my ride. “Oi!” I yelled, “Stop blowing holes in my ship!” (Not they either heard me or listened because they did it again!) Over the comm in my ear, I could hear Luna laughing at me. I waved at her in the nearby building where she was searching for more people to evacuate. And then how could a genius be so stupid? He shot the damn spider I was riding on out from under me! I’m a telekinetic, but my levitation skills were not up to par—at least not under pressure—Luna launched herself from the side of the building to give me a hand (when panicking, we weren’t always the most logical of people) and then the moron shot the both us just as Luna grabbed hold of my wrist and vanished us, only to reappear us fifty feet down on the sidewalk. 

Sprawled across the sidewalk, with Luna’s hand still around my wrist, I began to curse, vividly in six languages. When Luna looked at me puzzled, I shook our joined arms. When Luna finally saw what I saw, she too began to curse, loudly in four other languages. The Tin Man’s last blast had only made one point of contact, our wrists and our respective bracelets. We were not getting out of this one without visual conformation of our existence. 

Unfortunately, we didn’t have long to get really worked up about it—which was a shame, between us we’re very creative when it comes to curses, and once we get started it was usually highly entertaining. Less than ten seconds later, we were up and back into the fray, Luna taking out six spiders in one go as she magicked herself back into the building. I was about to grab onto yet another spider when something came to a skidding stop on the pavement in front of me. I’d already grabbed it before I realized what it was; big, round, and obnoxiously colored—I had my hand on none other than Cap’s patriotic Frisbee. Looking down the street, there was the Captain himself about to get mauled by a line of spiders. “Captain Obvious! Vatican Cameos!”

I could obviously count on the WWII vet to recognize the phrase, to the floor he dropped (and I wished I’d had time to appreciate the view) and with a little extra ‘umph’ from my abilities, (and my mad skills at Ultimate Frisbee) I flung the shield right through them, split them down the middle. “Three strikes you’re out at the old ball game!”

The Captain got to his feet, retrieved his shield and looked back at me. “Where’d you come from?” he asked me, taking a couple steps in my direction.

“I’m from Fresno, Ace,” I shot back as I picked up a fallen piece of debris and used it to skewer another oncoming spider midair. _Huh, he looks like the stories,_ I thought to myself, looking back at the Captain’s s astonished expression as I jumped on another spider _he's as real as Grandpa Jim always said_. 

***

When I finally made it to the ship, no thanks to those two flying monkeys, I was somewhat impressed. It really was a hive on the inside, all pigeon holes and cubicles with tech like nothing I’d ever seen before. If only I’d had more time, I would have been all over that. But the sounds of the battle raging below me echoed throughout the ship and spurred me on, tracking down the strongest mind in the place. I felt like I’d jumped into the evil version of the T.A.R.D.I.S. because the ship felt so much bigger on the inside. But eventually I found ~~it~~ _her_ , the hive’s queen. If I thought the fifteen to twenty feet creatures were ugly, then she was monstrous. A good thirty feet tall and swollen like a balloon, she was reminiscent of a queen bee or ant, just with a massive spider for a head, and constantly laying eggs that smaller creatures took somewhere. Oh the joys of hive mentality, they had their task, nothing would interrupt them not even an intruder like me.

None of the other creatures I’d taken over has minds sophisticated enough for a thought process the way you and I might imagine but she could after a fashion. _So, small, ugly creature,_ she said to me, the echo of her voice in my head like the crunching, gargling sound of the garbage disposal, _who are you who comes before me?_

“I am she who would have you leave my world peacefully or I shall be forced to destroy you,” I answered aloud, just to drive the echo from my ears. 

“Hey, there’s something to be said about being direct, Raven,” Luna’s voice broke through the comm, startling a laugh out of me and a rough, gravelly sound from the creature in front of me.

_Foolish one, we shall never leave. This world is ripe and pleasant, my children shall grow strong here, and you ugly, sacks of water, will make fine nourishment._

“Don’t say I didn’t warn you. I just took out two dozen of your children on the way up here without breaking a sweat; I sincerely doubt you’ll be that much of a challenge.” _Sometimes you gotta fake it ‘til you make it._

She hissed at me, a violent rattling gust that shook the ship beneath my boots and then she clumsily tried to invade my mind. In many ways she was a primordial being, something ancient and alien to this world. But at the same time, she was all brute force, no finesse or planning and no energy devoted to defending her own mind. Her initial onslaught made me waver and I dropped to one knee under the pressure she exerted, but when it got no worse, I realized that this was all she had, and I could work around that. Slowly, I began to push back, rising once more to my feet as I began to dismantle the battering ram she was using and slide into her own mind. 

A creature of mostly instinct, it didn’t take long for her to revert to ‘flight’ and ‘survival’ mode, draining energy from her psychic bond with her children in a desperate bid to push me out. But it was far, far too late for that. With a final ‘snip’ of my proverbial scissors, I had the very fabric of the creature queen’s essence in my hands. I sent out my own instructions for the remaining creatures to return to the ship, and used them to reprogram the ship to return to wherever it came from.

I began to walk back the way I came, still connected to the queen, and the sea of incoming creatures parted before me like I was a rock in their path. My final act before I began my own slow, hovering descent was to snap the thread holding the old queen to life, so that she would never return to Earth again. 

“I’m coming down, Smaug,” I said as I began the slow process of making myself levitate and began my descent, “Meet me halfway down and get us back, I need a damn shower.”

Still a good two hundred feet from the ground, Luna appeared beside me, also looking no worse for wear after our little excursion. She grabbed hold of my wrist once more, and we blinked out of Manhattan airspace.

***

Some twenty minutes later, midway through towel drying my hair, Luna called me into the front room, “Rin, you gotta come see this!”

“What, now, Luna, I’m working on my—“ I started but stopped when I caught sight of the T.V. All the news stations were running broadcasts about the two new ‘heroes’ who’d jumped in to save the day, though a couple of them were much less polite about it. There was grainy video of some of the spiders dropping dead of their own accord or people just appearing behind the police barricade after being purportedly rescued by a figure in black from some of the nearby buildings and then someone got the money shot right after Tin Man shot us down, of us falling from the sky, disappearing, and reappearing sprawled out on the sidewalk before jumping back into the action. 

Whoever shot it wasn’t close enough for sound, but they got a great shot of Luna scaling a building to return to the rescue and then a panorama shot of me taking grabbing Cap’s shield and decimating the creatures who were about to have him for lunch. 

There were shots of Luna rescuing people and then causing things to explode; and me jumping from back to back of each different spider thing when I wasn’t lifting debris without touching it and making spider shish-kabob with it. We were looking pretty badass, if I did say so myself. The news crews even had a name for us. They were calling us the Phantom Twins—which was ludicrous in its own right, even with the matching costumes, there was a fairly different size differential between Luna and myself, I’m taller and heavier with a broader build, we don’t even move the same way, I mean honestly.

But the part that made my blood run cold was at the end when the newscasters said that ‘the proper authorities’ were looking for those two ‘heroes’ and then appealed to the public, the whole if you have any information call this number shtick.

I sank down onto the sofa, towel and all. “Heimdallr, if ever I needed you before, I need you now. They can’t find us, not now, not yet. You promised you’d be there if this ever happened. It’s been over a decade in the making, but it’s happening now.”


	6. "What's past is prolouge"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just a little backstory on Rin and why she of all people is calling on Heimdallr.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all, back again. I thought I was done for a while, but then I was talking to Luna . . . and we know where that gets me, no self control whatsoever. So here we are another chapter, mostly backstory, but then I can get on back to the present.
> 
> Also today, July Third is my birthday, so I was also in part being a Hobbit, who give away presents on their birthdays instead of receiving them, so here! Presents! (and if you wanted to throw some birthday wishes in there when you leave me a comment, I certainly won't be opposed to it!)
> 
> There are references in here, gotta catch 'em all!

Heimdallr, Heimdallr, where do I start when I talk about Heimdallr?

I suppose the best place to start would be the beginning, because starting at the end wouldn’t make much sense—especially since I don’t know the ending yet (Damnit, Jim, I’m a telepath, not a psychic!).

 _Anyway,_ moving on, the beginning would have to be my parents, Antón and Yasu Suero. It sounded cold to say it this way, but the only reason they were important was because they had me. I never met them; they died in a car crash on the way to the hospital for a routine checkup about six weeks before I was due. Apparently, it was some miracle I survived. 

Still not the important part. There was a Japanese-American nurse in the hospital who named me while they were searching for next of kin—she called me Rin, which translated into ‘severe, cold, and dignified”, things she thought a child without parents would likely become, but I’m still not quite at the important part. Next of kin they found was my mother’s father, pushing eighty years old, yet still hale and healthy enough to take on the responsibility of raising his granddaughter—former Howling Commando Private James ‘Jim’ Morita. And thus we arrived at the important part, Grandpa Jim (if you couldn’t tell).

***  
Grandpa Jim was the best; it was difficult to remember that I was supposed to miss having actual parents when he was around. Grandpa Jim never wanted me to miss out on things, so we were always going on adventures; fairs, movie theaters, bookstores—the list went on. People think I don’t remember that well, but I did, and I do. 

But the best things about Grandpa Jim went hand in hand; he had the best stories and he knew how to listen, I mean really listen, like every word you said was poetry, the kind of listening that made you want to say only things worth that kind of attention.

My favorite stories though were the true ones, the ones from the war, about the Howling Commandos. Peggy first, he’d always start off with Peggy, so I’d have a role model who never gave up, then he’d talk about Dum Dum’s bowler hat, how Dernier and Jones were sleeptalkers, Falsworth who made blowing things up look easy, and lastly he’d talk of the two who fell, Barnes first and then Rogers just a short while later. Sometimes they made him sad, but he’d never shirk from telling me the truth. He used to talk about all his old journals and gear from back in the day in his storage unit, things that would be mine when he was gone. I was kid, I didn’t think much about it at the time, but he was over eighty years old, it was the kind of thing he had to at least start to think about, but we didn’t realize how soon. Grandpa Jim had a stroke just a few months shy of my eighth birthday. 

The law was sometimes very unforgiving, so I stood by a grave in Arlington and was handed an American flag, and then whisked off into the system.

The foster system wasn’t the kindest of places even for the best kids. I’d spend as much time as I could away from the homes as I could. Libraries became my refuge, my safe place.

One of the worst parts about being in the system was the fact that there wasn’t anyone to listen, to really act like they understood you and wanted to hear what you had to say. Less than two months after Grandpa Jim’s passing, I was really missing that about him. Something was wrong with me—things were too noisy, just walking into a room with other people was noisy, even if they weren’t saying anything. I couldn’t talk to my foster parents about this, and the social worker was so obviously _over_ worked that I didn’t think I could say anything to her either. Hence libraries, in the old sections with the dry history books and crumbling mythological texts—nobody went there, and for a little while things would be quiet again.

That was when in the old texts from Norse mythology about a god called Heimdallr and what struck me was that "he was attested as possessing foreknowledge, keen eyesight and _hearing_ ”, and hearing was close enough to listening, wasn’t it? And he was supposed to live in "his dwelling Himinbjörg, located where the burning rainbow bridge Bifröst meets heaven." I thought that maybe this Heimdallr guy could talk to Grandpa Jim for me, and even if he couldn’t, the idea that someone would listen to me was such a relief that I began that very night.

For years, no matter where I was or what the weather, I’d climb trees or rooftops to find a place to look up at the sky and talk to Heimdallr. Sometimes it wasn’t even anything important, just my day or how i missed Grandpa Jim, my favorite book, or a movie I’d seen part of. But as I got older, the noise began to get worse and then suddenly I’d hear things that nobody had said, things they never would have said aloud. I was terrified that this foster family would find out and have me sent away.

I was out there on the roof, almost crying because I was so terrified about being sent away again and telling all this to a specific patch of sky that I’d deemed was Heimdallr’s, when for the first time, he spoke back. I was so freaked out I almost fell five stories.

***

From that night on, Heimdallr and I spoke most every night, just in my head. Heimdallr was the one who taught me that I could read minds, lift things with my brain too. It wasn’t something he could personally do, but in Asgard the talent/ability/power wasn’t entirely unheard of, it was just extremely rare. The reason it was getting worse, the noise was because I was finally coming into my abilities fully. (I blamed the early onset of puberty—he didn’t, perhaps couldn't dispute the possibility of that.)

The brain was a muscle he said; with practice it could do all kinds of things. It could also be ‘tamed’ in manner of speaking. I’d never be able to shut out all the voices, you can’t wear earmuffs on your brain after all, but I could learn to let the words roll off me, I didn’t have retain the information, just let it pass by. 

I asked him once, why he’d chosen to answer me of all people when he was so far away and he confided in me that he’d developed a soft spot for me—it got lonely those long nights on watch and my act of talking to him, especially my loyalty, every night, earned me loyalty in return. When the X-gene and anti-mutant thing became a thing I asked Heimdallr if he could see what would become of me. He promised me his aid, should I ever fear discovery in a way I couldn’t prevent myself.

Hence why now, with the news stations running constant coverage of our ‘courageous act, I was once again calling on Heimdallr, the first person who ever knew what I was and acceptted me for it. But by that same token, I had long ago accepted that Heimdallr had much bigger concerns than just one mere mortal, and that sometimes he saw things that could happen, not what was necessarily to come to pass, and as such gave very cryptic advice, so when his deep voice resounded in my head and told me that no, I would not be discovered yet, but I would need to let myself be seen soon—but no harm would come to me and mine in the doing so—what the fuck was a girl to do?

I looked up at Luna who was staring at me in concern. “I need to get drunk. Very drunk. Make it happen.”

And Luna, bless her, all she does is smile brightly and pull two large bottles of something into existence. “I can do zhat!” she said, in her best Chekov impression. I felt better already.


	7. "For a quart of ale is meal to a king."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The ladies get really very drunk, eventually go be superheroes again, and then have a brilliant idea, all while still trying to enjoy their vacation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all, back again. I thought I was done for a while, but then I was talking to Luna . . . and we know where that gets me, no self control whatsoever . . . again. 
> 
> So here we are another chapter for you dear readers.
> 
> There are references in here, gotta catch 'em all!

When possibly being hunted by an entitled, manipulative, bald prick with a secret agenda and varying capabilities for making your life hell, what do you do? (Now though, am I talking about Cueball or Professor X-rated? Hmmmm . . .) Add in the fact that your friend/mentor, an all-seeing god from ancient mythology told you that you were going to be discovered after basically living in hiding for the majority of your life—soonish, maybe—and it was _necessary_ for you to be so, but don’t worry about it? Not to mention the Avengers and who even knew how many of the other government agencies were in on the hunt. What can you do?

Answer: get drunk off your fucking ass! (Which is funny; between us, I’m Ace, and Luna’s Demi—there were literally no fucks to give!)

Luna and I were back in our hotel room before midnight (time zones being a thing) and we drank. And drank. And drank. And attempted to drink ourselves into a stupor. I said attempted because it doesn’t work very well. Luna, the dragon, sometimes I don’t even know about that woman. I think it must be either a metabolism thing or a magic thing. Or the simplest answer could just be that she was the reason for the stereotype about the Irish and drinking. And then there was me. It wasn’t a metabolism thing as my extra padding would attest too—but yeah, drunk? Not a thing I could do. And believe me, I’ve tried.

. . . At least it didn’t until I asked Heimdallr if he knew of anything that could get a dragon drunk. And then we may have had a few cases of Asgardian mead show up. And I don’t think either of us remember what happened next . . .

(Stupid decision I’m sure, but that seemed to be the current trend in my life; one stupid decision after another. But hey, that’s what your 20’s are for, right? Right?! Right . . .)

But not every stupid decision can last forever, so when I dragged my sorry ass out of bed the next evening, I went to work. Heimdallr said discovery was more or less inevitable, fine, but that didn’t mean I was going anywhere on anything but my own terms. Cue the laptop and eight tablets (I had Luna go home for the rest of them—we were still on vacation damnit!) I hacked back into various government systems and took a look at their current investigations into us. There wasn’t much, as I suspected, so I left them alone for the moment.

S.H.I.E.L.D. actually impressed me for once; someone had connected our recent activities with our too-perfectly timed rescue of the Avengers previously, and assumed that we were one and the same. The theory had been flagged but then the investigation stalled out—they’d tried sending someone to question the Avengers, again, about their escape from the Chinese facility, and that poor baby agent had walked in on Agent Romanov during knife practice. Needless to say, the poor baby could barely squeak out his excuse for showing up uninvited, let alone ask questions. So we were fine on that front, for now.

I also sent out a few feelers, checking out the chat rooms and the news stations. I don’t trust the court of public opinion for anything, but it couldn’t hurt to have people in our proverbial corner when the inevitable happened. 

And I was surprised, no, perhaps astonished was the better word for it. Eyewitness accounts outed us as females, and we had a surprising following for only having made one ‘appearance’ as it were and considering the rampant sexism in our society. So all in all, things were not as bad as they could have been, and I could breathe again.

Then the next problem was getting our bracelets fixed. Luna had to remind me that they were broken, I’d almost forgotten. I took mine off and examined it under the light, trying to see if they were salvageable. “Shit,” I said, rubbing my eyes. If they were, it was far beyond my skill.

“No good?” Luna asked me and all I could do was shake my head, “Where’d you get them anyway? Because as useful as these things have been, you certainly didn’t find them on the street.”

“Don’t ask; you don’t want to know who I had to kill.”

Luna actually hesitated a few beats before she asked, “No, seriously, where’d you get them?”

“They were a gift.”

Luna sighed, “A gift from whom?”

“T’challa.”

Luna sighed even louder and asked again, “So why’d T’challa give them to you? And no one word or otherwise vague answers!”

“Officially? They were a thank you present after I helped with some security issues he’d been having, S.H.I.E.L.D. poking its nose in where it didn’t belong among other reasons.”

Now Luna looked interested, “And _unofficially_?”

“They were a thank you present from a grateful scene partner.” Luna just looked annoyed and I took pity on her this time. There was a time and a place to be a little shit, and that time was coming to an end. “Not only am I damn good at what I do, but he can count on my absolute discretion and thanks to you, I can be wherever he is in seconds—hence why you got a bracelet too. Add in the fact that he can claim legitimate reasons for being seen with me, both on a business and personal level, and there you have it.”

“Aside from pretty and useful presents, what do you get out of your relationship with him?”

“I get an ‘s’ type who I don’t have to keep secrets from, one who’s need to serve and let go lines up well with my need to command and to care for and protect. He’s got an image to maintain and a country to run, there are only so many people in his life that he could even consider mentioning these desires to, let alone act on them.”

Luna’s eyes were starting to glaze over, so I finished off with the kicker that I knew would get her, “Plus, being what he is, I can flog the hell out of him until he can’t even remember his own name. He’d just have to make do with mine.”

“Damn it!” Luna mumbled as she half fell over into my lap. Yep, I’ve still got it.

“You're gone aren't you?”

“Yep. Higher than a kite. Shit! I didn't think you'd space me . . .”

“Sweetheart, we've figured out that it doesn't take much for me to get you there. You okay?”

“Yup. Just perfect.” 

“Do I need to apologize?”

“Nope, you’re just fine. _I’m_ fine, everything’s fine.”

“Okay, sweetie,” I said, petting Luna’s hair, “take your time. Come back when you're ready. I'll be here.” 

Since we were going to be here for a while, I flicked my fingers for a blanket and my cell, draped the blanket over Luna, and then hit the second number on my speed dial, below Luna and above my publicist. 

“Good evening, Ms. Suero,” T’challa said, his voice warm and low when he picked up the phone. “It is good to hear from you again so soon. Tell me; is this for business call or a social call?”

I laughed and responded sweetly, “Does it matter, my prince? Business, social, last I checked, both were held in equal esteem and were of great pleasure to participate in. Have you forgotten my last visit so quickly? I should have thought I left a _lasting_ impression.”

There was a pronounced silence on the other end of the line before he spoke again, just the slightest hitch in his voice that let me know my innuendo struck home, “It can never be said that you do not leave such an impression whenever I have the chance to see you.” After clearing his throat, the prince tried again, “But still, there is some reason why you have called so soon after we said goodbye?”

“Unfortunately, I do have an ulterior motive this time. There was an _incident_ if you will, and the bracelet set you gave me was damaged. I believe it’s beyond my skill to fix; is there some way I can have them repaired?”

“You should take better care of my gifts,” T’challa said, “Else I might believe you ungrateful and not give you another.” 

I shook my head; silly thing liked having an opportunity to tease me. “ _I_ take excellent care of my toys, a fact you should well know,” there was a sharp inhale and shaky sigh on the other end. _Gotcha_ , “And I assure you, the next time I have to see the ham-fisted child who broke my present, he’ll regret it.” 

A few more veiled innuendos, punctuated by our soft laughter and T’challa and I arranged for Luna to drop the bracelets at our usual spot, though he did warn me that it might take a while to recreate the bracelets to my specifications. But what choice did I have? Thank the gods we chose a vacation spot that had significantly less cameras and the like to avoid, or we’d have had to be on what would amount to self-imposed house arrest. We finished our conversation and said our goodbyes and that, for once, was that.

***

_**“. . . and that, for once, was that.”** _

Or so I thought, because with Luna and me, nothing was ever over. Over the course of the next three weeks of our vacation, she had us show up to help the Avengers seven more times; thrice more in Manhattan, once in Kansas (of all places, insert Wizard of Oz joke here please), once in Australia, and twice out on the open ocean (over a cruise ship in the Pacific and an airplane carrier in the Indian Ocean respectively). Vacations were supposed to be relaxing! I was not relaxed!

The only good thing that came out of our constant appearances was the fact that I got to practice levitating—and I got to be pretty good it, if I did say so myself. (And what do you know, I did.)

Since our bracelets weren’t fixed to operate at optimal levels, we didn’t go out with them most of the time, so our appearances on news channels became somewhat more frequent. Our fan base grew, government agencies tore out their hair, and S.H.I.E.L.D. ran around in circles looking for us (and found nothing, which I was grateful for). The Avengers did a lot of staring, and the media persisted with their insipid nickname for us, The Phantom Twins.

That was my current gripe, staring the juxtaposed footage compiled over the last few weeks of our appearances. We were not twins and we were hardly phantoms. I suppose I should be glad for small mercies, we could have ended up with some sort of sexist nickname. The head to toe black leather look could have called for dominatrix jokes (and that would have been insulting on so many levels). There were some great shots of us whizzing about here and there and blowing things up—safely, we’re very good at avoiding wanton destruction—and generally kicking ass and taking names all over the place. 

Of course, the most footage out there is from whenever we were in Manhattan because of course for biggest impact, terrorists and aliens and whoever the fuck villain of the month was thought New York was perfect, so we were home a lot on this vacation.

In fact, we were home so often they should have called us the ‘Phantoms of Manhattan or some— _wait . . . OH!_

“Luna!” I called, jumping up from what I considered 'my' seat on the balcony and reentered our suite, “Where you at?”

“Here, Rin, where’s the fire?” Luna said, poking her head out of her bedroom.

“I just had the best idea!” 

She just gave me a look, “And this was more important than my book and my tea?”

I wavered a little, because for me, a bibliophile and best-selling author, to another bibliophile and hoarder of books, that something was that didn’t come naturally, calling anything more important than books. “Not exactly _more_ important shall we say, but pretty important.” Luna tilted her head to and fro for a moment before she closed her book and looked at me properly.

“What would you say to me if I said I had an idea for a play?”

“Go on.”

“A modern-day parody of sorts of _The Phantom of the Opera_ using our current sightings as heroes and calling it “The Phantoms of Manhattan”. Well?” 

“Where do I sign?”

***

For once, this pair of insomniacs didn’t sleep for a much more pleasant reason than the insomnia itself. By noon the next day we had a rough draft of a script and I’d emailed my publicist about this new venture of mine. She was ecstatic about the project, less so when I told her I wanted it on Broadway by next year at this time, if not sooner. But since I was going to fund the venture out of pocket (hey, I always wanted to add producer to my list of titles) and we’d cast specially through Julliard’s current classes and recent grads, Luna would be my co-writer and my main director while I would be the sole producer—well, it didn’t take long for her to cave. What I want, I get. It’s good to be the King (in a manner of speaking). Besides advancing my career in new directions, I had an ulterior motive. This musical could only help us if we wrote it, fanning the flames of our popularity, because if as Heimdallr said our discovery was going to be inevitable, then I wanted as many people in our corner as possible.

And my publicist was and has always been a Godsend; she got me a two week run at the beginning of June, just under a year from now, which for anyone else would make this an impossible venture. But Luna and I thrive on the impossible. Julliard was more than happy to allow Professor Draconis to use our play as a special topic for this school year; after all the publicity alone would do wonders for the school. And the debut musical by both the professor herself and the elusive author ‘E. Ueno’ how could they refuse?

A few days later, with a new and improved in script in our hands, we returned to Manhattan to begin out next great adventure.


	8. "One Man in his Time Plays Many Parts"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The ladies deal with a bit of a surprise and continue to prepare for their big day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi guys, sorry this took so long, things kinda got away from me . . . as did this chapter. I had meant to get all the way through to opening night, because there's all kings of fun stuff planned for then, but in order not to make the chapter too massive I've stopped it here for now, and I should hopefully have another chapter up within a week, maybe ten days tops. I was away so long I have to make amends.
> 
> As usual there are references scattered throughout, brownie points to those who can catch 'em all!

The next few weeks passed quietly, or at least what now passed for our kind of quiet. Production for _The Phantoms of Manhattan_ was in full swing; I dropped another novel; Luna was her fabulous self as a first time director and her usual professor mode; and my publicist went mad with the advertising—what was just supposed to be a two week run of our satirical musical turned into an eighteen month production with a massively supped up timeline.

***

We'd almost finishing up casting when my publicist called. This woman was genius with a tendency to go ‘bigger is better’—and this was no exception! The news about us putting on this production was barely a week old and she called me up, babbling out the wazoo. I was so glad to be on a chai run when I got the news—we, as the Phantom Twins had gotten so popular and the news of my turning producer and playwright—well, we sorta, kinda, maybe, broke the Internet? I, like a mature adult who can handle anything, dropped both our teas, nearly had a rom-com moment where I spilled all over a really cute stranger, and then had to buy more tea.

The demand for our production had skyrocketed, so that little two week run in June wasn’t going to cut it anymore, and were we capable of making a the show happen by October? A quick mental conversation with Luna and well, it looked like we were going to have a full schedule in the next upcoming months. I don’t even want to know who they had to drop in order to get us the stage space, but onward into the breach! Opening night for _The Phantoms of Manhattan_ was now on Halloween, which made Luna and I giggle. The whole thing could be a complete flop, and as it stood, it looked like we were going profit from this venture inside of six months.

There was a bit of a snafu with Stark Industries legal team because Tony Stark had done something smart when he’d acquired full rights to the Avengers and their likenesses—so that was a bit of a hassle, but not as bad as I thought. The legal team my publicist hired seemed oddly confused at how little it took for them to allow the production, but I guess somebody had the brilliant idea to offer as compensation half the profits to the Maria Stark Foundation as a gesture of goodwill, and that seemed to be the tipping point that allowed us to continue. 

(Something about that whole exchange bugged me. Considering who Stark currently worked with, that could have been indicative of somebody figuring things out. But between my distractions over the play, my latest novel, and Heimdallr’s words still niggling at me, I didn’t dedicate as much time as I could have to that issue.)

I originally spent a lot of time hanging around the theater, usually up in second tier so I could see everything without being seen and relay my comments via Luna via her Bluetooth. As it turned out though, I had a surprising number of fans among our actors, and the idea that I was somewhere about, watching them, well, it led to some rather ridiculous mistakes as students tried to impress me. Which as one could imagine, led to more frustration than Luna should have had had to deal with, _but_ it also meant that there was a great deal of hard work put in to make up for the aforementioned. That was probably the only reason she didn’t kick me out of her rehearsals—which she technically should have done, regardless of this being our little love-child project; a frustrated best friend and director, a ruined stage (twice), actors who stuttered, and a paintball/shaving cream explosion (don’t ask) later, and it almost wasn’t worth me sticking around.

And so I didn’t . . . for about three days. After that, I just stopped advertising I was around and hid better. And things did improve as time went by, so Luna was able to smile again. She'd spent the previous two weeks glaring at me across the penthouse. And while normally, this wouldn’t cause any (well, _too_ many) issues between roommates, nobody else I know lives with a dragon. She glares, and smoke starts to escape her nostrils. Needless to say, I made myself scarce during that time . . . well, aside from lots of tea (Earl Grey milk tea made with sweetened vanilla almond milk with one lump of sugar, oh yeah, I know what she likes) and you don’t even want to know how much Crème brûlée I had delivered to the penthouse. Eventually she stopped glaring at me and when she dropped into my lap for scritches again, I knew I was forgiven. 

And so the show went on. Then we hit upon a positively brilliant (and somewhat evil) idea for a publicity stunt. We offered two free tickets to the ‘Phantoms of Manhattan’ themselves. We’d leave them Box Number Five for their exclusive use and we hoped to see them at the show. And then we sat back and cackled at the irony. And then laughed more when we broke the internet . . . again. 

***  


One of the other things we had to do in preparation for opening night was something just for us. Opening night of our first big production on Halloween of all nights? We were going full masquerade on this bitch, gowns and Venetian masks all the way. Except . . . well . . .

“Here, I’ve found it. I’m going in this one!” Luna exclaimed, pointing a finger at one of the floating screens. Luna was pointing at a dark red, strapless ball gown, with black beaded embroidery, fitted to waist where it then flared out over seemingly miles of black tulle. 

“And then this mask, simple, plain black with a little bit of rhinestones and some understated wine-red glitter—but that peacock decal next to the feather? That’ll never do—they’ll have to replace it with a dragon—Rin are you listening to me?”

Luna rolled slightly from where we were sprawled out on her bed, staring at my array of floating tablets, and poked me in the shoulder—hard.

“Hey, you, I’m talking to you! Earth to Gimli? I’ve only been planning for events like this my entire life! Now what—“

I interrupted Luna’s tirade by mumbling something incomprehensible when I should have spoken aloud. She responded by poking me again. And then I kicked her—because we are responsible functioning adults, I swear! 

“Come on, just spit it out!”

“. . . the fuck do I wear?”

“Seriously?! That’s your problem?”

I hit her with a pillow.

Sputtering, Luna tried again, “Honestly, just let me—we could do sort of a "you complete me" outfits... like when the petticoats or accents are the opposite of my colors or something. Does that help?”

“Sort of? I like dressing up, you know this, but this kind of a big deal and well—”

Luna interrupted me, again, “Also, as a recluse, are you gonna pull a Sia?”

“What?!”

“Oh don’t you start! I meant the whole not revealing your identity sort of thing?”

“Yes?”

“Well, then look at this mask, I saw it earlier and was kinda partial to it, but you know me and hats, just no bueno.” Luna grabbed one of the other tablets out of the air and pointed. A black mask trimmed in gold with a miniature pirate hat and a pair of roses, dark blue and gold respectively, filled the screen.

“I like that.”

“I figured you would. Don’t forget, I know what you like.”

“Isn’t that my line?”

Luna shook her head at me and then went back to the screens. “Oh, look at that!” She pointed to a dark blue gown in a similar style to hers, strapless with silver embroidery and belt and long, puffy, watered skirt. It even had a little cropped jacket to go with it. It was pretty, not going to lie, but it was a little too similar. I shook my head a little regretfully and went back to looking.

I countered with a fitted dress in royal blue, halter top with a lapel, vest looking front and a mermaid flare at the knee. My draconic best friend gave me a side-eyed glance, “You like the slinky style, don't you?”

I shrugged; a little awkwardly given I was lying flat on my back, “Sometimes. It just sort of depends. Also because of the way I'm shaped, too much extra fabric and then any shape I've got vanishes, so that may have a little to do with it.”

Luna showed me a few more ball gown style dresses, and while pretty, none of them quite did it for me. And then I found it! A long dark blue dress with a high collar and long sleeves, and a touch of dark beaded stitching along both. It was a little simple and almost vintage, but two things did it for me: a). it had pockets! And b). it split right between the collarbones into a slit that came down past the rib cage, making it a dress cut down to Venezuela!

Luna expressed a similar sentiment when I showed it to her, telling me that the cleavage in that one would be ‘epic’.

I retorted that anything on me would be given that I was the only one of us with actual boobs. Luna stared at me, and then she hit me with a pillow. And thus the Pillow Fight Wars of the Queer Penthouse were begun!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, and since I haven't figured out how to embed the pictures, here's the links to our outfits and masks:
> 
> Luna’s mask (replace the peacock with a dragon though)  
> https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fs-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com%2F736x%2F05%2F66%2Fe8%2F0566e8903e317fa1b6376b5e63b5a0f1.jpg&h=IAQE_YZCC
> 
> Luna’s dress opening night  
> http://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2F24myfashion.com%2F2016%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2016%2F01%2Fwpid-black-masquerade-ball-gown-2016-2017-0.jpg&h=IAQE_YZCC
> 
> Rin's mask  
> https://www.trendyhalloween.com/Assets/ProductImages/LadyPirateMaskBlack.jpg
> 
> Rin's dress  
> http://www.dhresource.com/0x0s/f2-albu-g3-M01-2A-8B-rBVaHVWSPCCAQjm8AAHWL8KK2JU786.jpg/dark-blue-modest-evening-dresses-2015-embroidery.jpg


	9. "All the world's a stage, and the men and women merely players"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Opening night, and a revelation!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Back again. Hi all, here it is, at long last, opening night! 
> 
> As usual, references abound when I get the chance to play, can you name them all?

Then seemingly all too soon, opening night was upon us. Luna and I were a hot mess, flying (somewhat literally) around our penthouse getting ready, constantly laughing, snapping at each other, both aloud and in the privacy of our own skulls, makeup and hair products flying every which way, pairs of shoes, a necklace or two—oh and the Mac-and Cheese . . . what? We had to eat before we went out, didn’t we? Don’t judge our life choices! We are mature and reasonable adults, I swear!

I wouldn’t admit it aloud, but I was more than a little nervous. This would be the first time I’d ever made a public appearance as E. Ueno, the first in many steps I imagined I’d be taking in the near future to go public. Less than a year ago, this sort of thing would have been the furthest thing from my mind, and yet here I was. 

Of course, a year ago, we hadn’t rescued the Avengers and Heimdallr hadn’t decided to go all vague and prophetic on me either, so I guess that was just par for the course in my life. 

But first, survive opening night. 

***

I’d been honestly, privately, terrified about how the show would have been received, but when the curtain went up and the opening refrain of the iconic _Phantom of the Opera_ theme began to play, the audience went wild and I could breathe again. I glanced over at my best friend and smiled slightly. Luna was practically drooling beside me. Dress rehearsals had been one thing, but the actual opening night, what with the lights and the audience—this was her crowning achievement, the kind of thing she’d been working towards her whole life.

This was a jewel in her crown and I would do whatever I had to do to add more jewels to it. I must have let as much slip down the mental link Luna and I usually use to communicate because she smiled and reached over to give my hand a squeeze without taking her eyes from the show. _And this is why I love you._

I squeezed back and then retrieved my hand, _Ugh, don’t do that—you’ll give me a case of the feels—my insurance doesn’t cover that!_

_You do see the irony here, don’t you?_

I harrumphed quietly and looked away pointedly; Luna’s quiet giggling echoing in the back of my mind. In an effort to distract myself from these, these—what are these feelings, so sudden and new?—yes, I spend way too much time in and around the theater and its people, namely, Luna, but I digress—and looked around the darkened theater. A completely sold out house—with the exception of box Number Five—on Halloween and the seats were packed with people in costumes and other forms of fancy dress. And then I noticed we were being watched, one of those sixth sense sort of scenarios (well, as a telepath, does that make that a _seventh_ sense?) and when I glanced over, there was a man in another box on the other side of the theater, staring.

When I turned to look at him properly, a little difficult to do in the dark, he must have noticed me watching him watch us, and he flashed a smile, I think, and a jaunty little wave, before turning back to the performance. Being kinda, sorta flirted with across a darkened theater—that was the plot of the actual _Phantom of the Opera_ wasn’t it? I shook my head and went back to watching our performance.

***

And I wouldn’t have thought anything more about it until when intermission came and the lights came up, and I looked back over at the other box and there was Tony fucking Stark staring at us . . . again . . . or well, maybe it was me, I did have the dress cut down to Venezuela after all, and Luna was . . . oh no. Luna had her mask in one hand and her phone in the other, gesturing with them to make a point about the lighting. I opened my mouth to warn her and then her phone buzzed. She went to check it and froze.

'Have you thought at all at how good we would look together?'

It read from an unknown number . . . but not an unknown source. Stark was siting over there, smiling like an asshole, phone in hand. Luna’s head swung around and saw him and then she started freaking out, just a little, even if that reaction was overlaid by her rising indignation. “Oh that bitch, did not just—did you see—have you read—“

Luna couldn’t even finish a complete thought, let alone an actual sentence. Not that I could say I was much better. Luna’s prickly enough on her own, but it was practically hard wired into my DNA to protect those I care about—Luna more than counts, however capable she is at protecting herself, but this was her night, and no sleazy playboy with a complex or two was going to ruin my best friend’s night.

So I went on instinct. I leaned over, yanked her close, took a grip of her hair—carefully, didn’t want to mess up her hairstyle—and sank my teeth into the space where her neck met shoulder, one of Luna’s (and mine) favorite biting spots. Luna shuddered and went limp in my arms, just what I wanted. Maybe not the most orthodox of gestures, but it was grounding on a number of levels and since Luna was freaking out on me, well, I went with what worked . . . and if it also meant I could piss the entitled child across the way off, then I had even more reason to do so. I even tilted my head a little so I could stare Stark down as I did it. _Bitch please. My dragon._

How effective it was with the mask on, I’m not sure, but my point was obviously made. Stark looked, well, I’m not sure, the distance made it hard to tell, but sort of like a cross between bitch-face and territorial, and I only dimly registered the two other Avengers in the box with him, obviously giving him shit. I removed my teeth from Luna’s neck and murmured quietly, “He’s being sleazy, but this is your night; you’re supposed to be enjoying it. So we’re going to sit back, relax and enjoy the fruits of our success, okay?”

“But—“ I grazed the mark on her neck lightly with my teeth. While Luna’s input was of usually of the highest concern to me, this is one argument I was more than willing to play dirty on. Luna shivered, “ . . . what was the question?”

“That’s better,” I said, pulling back a little and resettling us more comfortably just as the lights dimmed once more.

A few minutes later, _Rin?_

_Yes?_ I thought back.

_We need an escape plan, don’t we? To get out of here without being mobbed and now with Stark paying attention to us . . ._

_I’m working on it._

_Could we use the Phantoms? You know, since the box is open, what if they showed up accidentally, or coincidentally rather?_

_What, like have them show up on the stage?_ I asked, trying to follow the still slightly floaty dragon’s logic.

_No, that would draw the eye away from the show. But since we incorporated that box's use **for** the show, and had some of the actors, or their understudies, play "us" and take the bow, I can do that makeup, and in minutes, and then we could Phantom it up!_

_Okay, now you’ve lost me, silly dragon. Slowly, run through that again for me?_

_Argh! Rin! You’re throwing off my groove! In the play, the Phantom appears in Box Number Five, yes? As does Raoul. We use that, and at the end, the real phantoms show up, and you know how at the end of the play, the cast claps for the booth, representing their respect for the people backstage? We have them clap for the booth, clap for us, and then one of them turns and "sees" the phantoms, and a spotlight turns and we wave as the phantoms. To be able to pull this off, I'd have to get stand-ins for us, and do look-a-like makeup, which I've done before, so see, it’ll be easy!_

_Really? Easy? Just like that?_

_I could tell them that we have to leave early for a meeting with your publisher, or something . . . Which would be understandable. We go onstage, give the illusion that we're the ones in the booth, which we are. . . or were . . . Whatever. My point is once people expect something, it's very easy to fool them._

_Which means taking people into our confidence, Luna. I’m not objecting to the idea, just a few of the details. Could you just magic up some illusions of us while we're standing there as the phantoms or vice versa? Wouldn’t that be simpler?_

_. . . Or we could use magic . . . I was thinking as a theatre kid . . ._

_You are one, so I’ll forgive it this time. So we’re decided then._

_Yup._ Luna replied brightly, tilting her head to smile up at me.

_Good, now let me get back to the show._

_Harrumph!_

***

And the plan went off flawlessly. We exited our box to head down to the stage and as we rounded a corner, Luna replaced us seamlessly with magical doubles just as we phased out to go get our ‘Phantom’ gear on, and we arrived back at the theater in the right box to the thunderous applause for our lead actors, which gave us plenty of time to get into position. 

Our doubles came on stage, bowed, and bowed again, before the whole cast made to bow, and then one of our actors spotted us. They threw off the whole line, standing and staring before breaking the hold their neighbor had on them and pointing. One of the spotlights swung our way—it couldn’t have been more perfect had we rehearsed it—and there we were spotlighted in all our phantasmal glory. We being made of sass and all other glorious things, were standing on the balcony railings and executed low, almost formal bows, with the extended hand gestures and everything.

And then we vanished.

Our doubles were seen leaving the theater some time later getting into the car and were last seen pulling away from the curb before presumably headed home. We were already home with our drinks and our ice cream when Luna’s phone buzzed again.

'Come back with our Soulmate!'

Luna and I only had one appropriate response.

"What?!"


	10. "Everyone has their fate and the more people try to avoid it, the more trouble they get into"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Revelation, Soulmates, Avengers--and Tony Stark is an ass. That is all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry, I was gone so long, I didn't intend to leave you for so long. But I'm back and there are, as usual, references everywhere.

Luna and I stared at her phone like it was poison. Then Luna started fuming and I dove for my computers because if Stark could hack Luna’s phone (really easy since she was still carrying a flip phone) then he could find us, and now with this revelation in mind, we were really not prepared for this.

I had a program literally entitled ‘Panic Button’ for occasions like this . . . well, not this one precisely, especially not against an opponent like Stark, though more to the point, I was not prepared to go against J.A.R.V.I.S. 

Mutant with knack for the hack I am, sure, but human versus A.I.? Especially this one? Oh Sekhmet’s tits! (What? I try not to curse via my God, and Heimdallr told me he was uncomfortable with me swearing by Nordic mythological figures as he knew most of them personally, but so far, everyone else was fair game.)

So I was trying to buy us time before Superpowered Peeps found us, and doing everything I could to keep them from away, even if just for a little while longer. 

As I was typing away, suddenly, Luna spoke up from behind me, “Rin?”

“Yes?” I said, turning my head to look back at her.

“He said, ‘our’—who did he mean?”

I flipped over and dropped onto the couch, laptop and tablets floating by. “Well, Stark, clearly. In retrospect, we should have known, though in our defense, we were very distracted. But he was in the suit when you waltzed in—he’s your binary.”

Luna’s fingers automatically went to her neck. “Then these . . .” she placed her hands on her hips, “Those are . . .”

“The demigods from Norse mythology, yes,” I said when it looked like Luna wasn’t going to finish her sentence. 

“But,” she put her hand on her leg, “who’s that one? Can I even assume that they’re one of them? What are the odds, honestly? Actually no, not honestly, you’ll quote me some actual number that I don’t want to—“

“Luna,” I interjected before she could keep going, “It would be logical to assume that if three out of the four of your Soulmates are Avengers, that the fourth must be too. You determined a long time ago that the handwriting was male, so that excludes the Widow—“

“Yes, thank you, Mister Spock, that was beyond helpful.”

I glared at her without heat, “I wasn’t finished. We also determined that the writing was much more old fashioned than we were used to seeing, ergo there are two distinct possibilities given that we are talking about The Avengers here. Also, look here,” I said indicating one of my tablets. I pulled up my copy (well, the _only_ copy) of the security footage from the facility in China, the moment after Luna knocked the doors in. 

On scene Luna smiled and said, “Good evening, gentlemen and lady, I’ll be your rescuer today.”

And the idiots replied with, “What?!” But I played them back again, isolating each voice separately, and lo and behold, we discovered that of the two geriatric super soldiers who could have possibly been Luna’s last Soulmate, only Mister Stars-and-Stripes Forever had spoken in English. Barnes must have been caught up in a memory and so he’d responded in Russian.

“Eh voilà!” I said, “All four of your Soulmates, lined up in a row!”

Luna dropped onto the couch next to me and then flopped over with her head in my lap, bemoaning “the fates and the universe’s poor decision-making skills” and “the idiotic, unoriginal, dunces” she’d been saddled with and how badly she was going to kick their asses when she saw them—the usual stuff that she said when she was pissed about her Soulmates and Marks respectively, only this time since she had names, her threats were a little more personal.

She threatened to hit Thor over the head with his hammer, steal all of Tony’s suits and burn them with dragon fire, she must have like that one because then she wanted to see if Cap’s shield would hold up to her flame, and Loki? There was something said about twisting his silver tongue into knots and blasting him—and The Boats, and the rack and all sorts of other wonderful forms of torture for all. (What? I’m a sadist and she’s vengeful, it’s part of why we work so well together.)

_Oh boy. _I thought to myself after a while of listening to her, very carefully keeping Luna out of the loop, _I’m going to need to buy stock in popcorn—on the bright side, the popcorn will pop itself—actually is my homeowners insurance up to date to include fire protection and brawling? Better fasten my seatbelt, this is going to be a bumpy ride.___

\---

‘Panic Button’ program enabled or not, life went on as usual for us; Luna taught, I translated, and I waited for the other shoe to drop. It unfortunately dropped sooner than I expected. (And to be fair, it wasn’t all bad. J.A.R.V.I.S. and I ended up playing the hacking equivalent of tennis—and was it possible to flirt with an A.I? (I actually don’t know, but if Stark ever does show up, I would so tell him that I was, flirting with his A.I., that is.)) 

It was a fairly normal afternoon for the two of us; Luna was channel surfing on the couch in the main room and I’d just stepped out of a hot bath and was wringing out my hair when there was a knock at the door. 

“I’ll get it,” Luna called, rolling off the couch. 

“Wait, I need to check the—“ 

“Hi . . . well, fuck. You’re not the pizza man.” 

“Security cameras,” I muttered under my breath as I made my way to the front door. “I didn’t order a pizza,” I said louder as I enter the front room and made my way to stand beside Luna, who was blinking in confusion at her four Soulmates standing uncomfortably in our doorway. 

She was literally screaming on the inside of her skull, mostly to the tune of ‘who do these bitches think they are!’ but overlaid on top of that knee-jerk reaction was, _nope, not going to—conceal, don’t feel, don’t let them know—Stop laughing at me, Rin! They’re coming to take me away, haha! They’re coming to take me away, hoho, he he, ha ha!_

_To the funny farm where life is beautiful all the time,_ I finished in my head, because why not? It was one of life’s pleasures to have an insane best friend who got you, on all levels. Not to mention that I had time—her Soulmates were standing there, awkwardly, and no, we were not going to help them out one bit. Uninvited persons who show up on our (unlisted) doorstep without warning or bribing materials do not get invited to tea! 

The Man with the Plan was not living up to his name. Hand rubbing the back of his neck, he offered sheepishly, “We could, well, get you . . . pizza, if that’s what you wanted?” 

“The avenging business gettin' a lil slow?” Luna said to me, not taking her eyes off the Superheroes before us. 

“You know, I was wondering how S.H.I.E.L.D. was paying the bills . . .” 

The Prince of Daddy Issues apparently decided he was done waiting. He took two steps forward, as if to force his way past us and into our home. Luna and I were not having that, but before we needed to do anything, _Stark_ of all people grabbed Loki by the back of the collar and yanked him back. (And given the height difference, well, we had a laugh about it privately.) And then we had to fight to keep straight faces when clear as day came the prince’s thought of, _No, no, no killing Stark, not yet—he’s still useful._ while glaring at the billionaire. 

“Look,” the philanthropist himself began with a charming smile, “I think we got off on the wrong foot. I—well, _we_ would like to change that, especially since this very lovely lady,” he nodded and smiled at Luna, who frowned in response, “is our Soulmate, we appear to have things to discuss.” 

“Flatterer,” Luna responded coolly, “Tell me does that line work on all the girls?” 

“I don’t know, I’ve never had a Soulmate to use it on. And if I’d known how beautiful you were, I’d have come knocking earlier,” the billionaire let go of the prince’s collar and reached for Luna’s hand, still resting on the doorframe. Luna simply took her hand off the door and out of Stark’s reach. I guess being a playboy has its advantages because he just rolled with it and turned the gesture into a playful sort of bow. “Though I must say, with all that secrecy, one might almost think you didn’t want to be found. But I did.” 

Luna continued to look unimpressed and I raised an eyebrow (something that pisses her off because she can’t do it). _Laying it on a little thick, aren't you, boy? Or does it come naturally to a sleazy playboy?_ But I figured that now was the time to add my two cents. 

“Congratulations must be in order then for reaching new heights that the typical stalker could never quite fathom,” I said in response and suddenly, all four of them turned their attention to me. Previously they’d been so focused on the whole ‘Soulmate!’ thing that apparently they’d hadn’t really noticed me, my earlier snarky comments notwithstanding, which was just a wee bit insulting. “But now that you’re here, and once again proved your talent at going where you’re not wanted, you may go,” I even finished it off with a dismissive flick of my fingers, just to piss them off (and if it diverted their attention from Luna who was still inwardly going “oh, fuckity-fuck-fuck”, then all the better). 

Captain Spangles and Prince Puppy Eyes looked some cross between affronted and crushed that I was sending them away, Prince Gothic was looking at me like a bug under a magnifying lens, and the Tin Can was . . . was smirking?! 

“Well, now, on the one hand I suppose we _could_ ‘go’, as you put it,” the billionaire philanthropist offered, gesturing with one hand, “but on the other hand,” he indicated with his other, “I sincerely doubt that _you_ of all people would want us to go.” 

Now Luna was looking back and forth between one of her unoriginal, uninspired dunces and me like we were some kind of tennis match. “Oh really? _I_ don’t want you to go? Now how would you come to such a conclusion?” 

“See, when we were trying to find the very lovely lady next to you,” there went the charming smile again. Luna didn’t give him the satisfaction of a response, which I think threw him a little before continuing on, “it also meant that we were trying to find anyone close to her. And from what little we could find on you, well, it didn’t take a genius—which I am as a matter of fact—to figure out that you are the kind of person who would really hate it if I were to oh, say, cause a scene? 

I leaned forward a little to poke my head out the door and look up and down the empty hallway. We live in the penthouse for a reason, no neighbors, so what came out of my mouth (stupidly) was, “Cause a scene for who?” 

What I neglected to remember was that this was the same man who until very recently had his name splattered across his giant building for all to see. “Picture this, if you will, since I believe you’re some kind of writer,” the smirking asshat in question began, causing Luna to bristle beside me (she was also very proud of my accomplishments, as I was of hers, and slighting me was not the way into her good books either), “a press conference given by a handsome, well-known hero and genius billionaire philanthropist—and other heroes,” he amended when the geriatric soldier beside him cleared his throat pointedly, “who having finally found their Soulmate, one they’ve been watching for, for so long—Steve here especially might actually shed a tear—and what luck! She’s as heroic as she is beautiful—and oh tragic, spiteful Fate! To have happiness stand before you and then to have your hopes dashed by the cruelty of her roommate . . .” Stark’s eyes closed and he put his hands over his heart—Arc Reactor—an expression of exaggerated agony crossing his features, only to be spoiled by his cracking on eyelid open to stare at me. “And if by chance, a certain address then gets released to the public so that the adoring public might begin a letter writing campaign on our behalf? Do you really want us to go now?” 

My left eye developed just the slightest tick during Stark’s speech and the polite, almost bored look on my face was frozen. I don’t know which of us was more angry, me or Luna at this point—though I think this time Luna was more concerned for me (by a slim margin, but it was there) because I do not take well to being forced into anything, especially when it came to people in my space. Probably a byproduct of being in the system, I’m possessive about things that are mine, and having a space I could call my own after being shunted between foster homes for years was worth more to me than almost anything in the world. 

But so did my privacy and he was Luna’s Soulmate, even if he was being an ass, so with great reluctance and my head held high, I stepped back from the door and swept over to the couch and dropped onto it. (And if I did it in such a fashion as to make my robe (the kind you’d see in movies when the police show up to tell a woman her fantastically rich husband is dead, you know the kind) sweep out behind me dramatically and make it ever so obvious that we weren’t expecting guests, then all the better.) 

From somewhere behind me, I heard Thor of all people ask, “Will she not bid us welcome to your home?” 

And I could always count on Luna to be in my corner, even when against her newly discovered Soulmates, when she snorted and replied, “Don’t push your luck, Goldilocks. After you just blackmailed your way in here after stalking us, you’re lucky to not be dead. I’d have expected better manners from royalty.” Then she turned on her heel in the affronted silence that followed and sat next to me in a show of solidarity as her four Soulmates made their way through the doorway and into seats, all now very carefully avoiding sitting on the enormous couch Luna and I had laid claim to. 

And then we proceeded to sit in this awkward, silent stare off. It was once again extremely obvious that they had no idea what they were supposed to do with themselves once they made it through the door. Stark looked at Rogers as if to say, ‘This was your idea, now what?’ 

Then suddenly Luna picked up her head and said, “Damnit, now I want pizza!” 

“We can still get you pizza, if you want?” Cap offered hesitantly, having finally decided to grasp on the edges of a plan, “It’s the least we could do, after dropping in like this—“ 

“Damn straight,” Luna muttered, glaring darkly at the blond supersoldier. 

Loki added smoothly, “Why not have the archer fetch pizza? I sincerely doubt that our gracious hostess and our Soulmate would like to have a gawking messenger at their threshold upon it’s’ arrival.” 

“That’s the first almost intelligent thing any one of you has said or done since you decided that stalking and threatening us was the best way into our good graces,” Luna shot back tartly, giving voice to both our thoughts and I just let her speak for the two of us. After all, these were her Soulmates, who were looking sort of sheepish—well, the blondies were, Loki just looked calculating, and Stark was texting. 

“Pizza is on its way,” he said, putting his phone away. Luna nodded slightly in acknowledgement, and then we lapsed back into silence. 

\--- 

Some twenty minutes later, there was once again a knock at our door. Luna and I shared a look and then we glared at the boys. We were not getting up, this was their brilliant idea, and they could take care of the details. 

Rogers took one look at our faces and he decided that discretion was the better part of valor and went to get the door. Hawkeye, or rather, Clint Barton stepped into our home carrying a ton of pizzas and laid them on the coffee table between the lot of us, and if the two of us spent a little longer than necessary staring at his biceps, that was no one’s business but our own. 

And then he looked up, met my eyes, and the bottom dropped out of my stomach when he said some frighteningly familiar Words, “So Stark’s certain that you’re the little girl who hacked him? Really?” Thirteen little Words, in messy chicken scratch, scrawled along my left shoulder blade, Words I knew all too well. 

Luna’s head shot up and she looked at us, her eyes wide. Dimly, I registered the fact that the other Avengers in our living room had gone eerily still. But all I could manage through numb lips was, “23-19,” and I was gratified in a way to see his eyes grow wide as he recognized the sound of my voice. His mouth moved in silent syllables of things he couldn’t get himself to say and his brain was scrambling, trying to catch up with the rest of us, but before he could utter another word, Luna was up in arms for me. I couldn’t even recall what she said, but less than three minutes later, our home was ours again and I was free to drop my head on the back of the couch and mutter curses to any god or being who was unfortunate enough to be listening. Luna just sat back down next to me and didn’t say a word. What else was there to say? 

We had Avengers for Soulmates. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, just so its clear, I love Laura Barton, I love what she represents and all that other stuff. But for the purposes of my AU, especially in light of some of the joke that Luna and I had made previously when planning even rough ideas for these fics, well, suffice to say, he's not married in this one and he's one of Rin's Soulmates.


	11. An Invitation to Dine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pepper to the rescue!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all, I keep apologizing for vanishing and then I do it again, thus rendering it useless. So, I will promise to do my best to not do either of those things anymore. But for now, I'm back enjoy.
> 
> And for those of you who care, I was using Shakespeare quotes for chapter titles, but recently I've been having trouble making those fit, so I may not do that anymore and so I may at some point go back and change titles of previous chapter so as not to make the change to jarring.

Soulmates accounted for: 

Luna: 4/4 

Rin: 1/5

. . . well, it looked like I had the plot of a new novel series all set up for myself, didn’t I? A mythological creature and her roommate and their wacky adventures with their Soulmates, set in a dystopian/post-apocalyptic world, just to make things interesting. Throw in a rousing murder mystery and a cast of colorful side characters to lead the heroines astray, and voila, one four part novel series that would sell better than that other four book series that I would rather not name did among the young adult/teen (predominantly) female audience. Who knew, it might even be good. 

Luna and I were, well, to put it bluntly, we were sulking. She now knew that all her Soulmates were unoriginal, uninspired dunces, who were willing to resort to blackmail and threats to get what they want, and me? The reason I didn’t buy Stark Tech, the reason I became a hacker—(and a damn sight better than Mr. Billionaire Playboy Philanthropist. _He_ hasn’t hacked in years, he’d been having J.A.R.V.I.S. do it, so for him to be so dubious about my skills—Argh! It’s enough to make a body scream!)—I’d found _him_ alright. 

But right, sulking, which meant several days of tea, a lot of chocolate, and live streaming musicals—no sappy romantic movies for us (why would we need one, we’re going to end up living one—or at least the first half of a B-rated rom-com—the happy ending was still up for some debate).

Then one day at about three, there was a knock on our door. Luna didn’t even bother to poke her head out of her blanket cocoon and said, voice only slightly muffled, “I learned my damn lesson, check the cameras. I’m not coming out unless it’s important.”

I stifled a derisive snort and made a grab for one of my nearby tablets. “Do we need a sign that reads, ‘if unimportant, don’t bother’ or something?”

“But then it sounds like we’d be calling other people unimportant.”

“But its’s true.”

“RIN!?”

“What?!”

“Don’t you start that again!” She sighed, “Well, who is it, after all that?”

“It’s . . . Mark, the new doorman?”

“Is there a problem?”

“He’s standing there, hair slicked back with a platter and card on it!—very _Downtown Abbey_ —did you hire a butler and not tell me? I didn’t think we were that pretentious.”

There was some shuffling under Luna’s blankets, and then one eye peered out at me. “Sweetie, even _I_ got it. He’s figured out exactly what you are and is trying way too hard.”

“Oh. _Ooh_ ”

“Yes, ‘oh’ is right. Hit the button, let the poor man in.”

Really didn’t have an argument for any of that, so I did, setting my tablet aside and going back to my book. Mark stepped in and shut the door quietly behind him.

“Yes?”

“There’s a visitor for you, ma’am. You and . . . Professor Draconis?”

“Here,” Luna responded to the question in his tone, even going so far as to untangle one arm and flap it in his general direction from the couch. She was always the more polite one; I was being horribly rude, I haven’t even lifted my gaze from my book.

“And?”

“After the um, _conversation_ you had a few days back with the boss after that sales group got past us, we came to the conclusion that it might be better to err on the side of caution and announce all visitors ourselves.”

 _Salesmen? Is that what we’re calling them?_ Came Luna’s sarcastic voice down our telepathic link.

 _Did you want to advertise that we had super-jerks on our doorstep?_ I shot back before switching gears to reply to Mark aloud. “Do we normally have visitors without informing you beforehand?” 

“No, ma’am. But,” he continued hurriedly, as apparently I was starting to glare at my page, “I think this time you might want to, err, make an exception. The card—“

“Well?” I held my hand out imperiously. (What?! I’m rude by nature (usually,) and still in bad mood . . . but still. My bad mood should not be taken out on a third party, especially one who was trying so hard to please me. And I do like it when people please me.)

And how I didn’t pick up on Mark’s orientation, I’ll never understand—apparently I’m becoming arrogant (and oblivious), because he responded to my implicit command with a sharp inhale and his exhale was as shaky as his hands when he held the platter out.

I plucked it up with two fingers, read it, and then nearly dropped my book. “You meant to tell me, that _Pepper Potts_ is here to see us?”

Luna shot upright, blankets starting to fall every which way. “Seriously? Pepper Potts and you left her standing outside?!” Luna and I were on our feet, because Pepper freaking Potts, that kind of brains and competence deserved better attire than pajamas and yoga pants.

“No, no, she’s in Ling’s office; she’s wringing her hands.”

“Potts?!”

“No, Ling. Fussing over the state of her office, not having—the point being, I assume you want her shown up?”

“Yes, yes, of course. Show her up—oh, and, Mark?” I said, stopping mid-step and turning my head over my shoulder.

“Yes?”

“Thank you for not holding my poor mood over my head and delivering the announcement in person.”

The man blushed, mumbled something incomprehensible, and left so quickly, I half-expected to see a trail of flames in his wake.

“’Assuming an apology without actually giving one. Presumptive arrogance which makes you appear the gracious one’, well. Looks like the description is spot on.”

“Shut up and stop reading my manuscripts, Luna!”

“Never!”

I threw my wadded up t-shirt at her (because I’m a grown-up, damnit!) and then went to get dressed to meet one of the most competent and powerful women in the business world. 

***

Less than ten minutes later, Pepper Potts was buzzed into the penthouse. In an immaculate off-white pantsuit and with a charming, even disarming smile, it wasn’t hard to see how she got to be one of the most influential and successful businesswomen in the world. “Professor Draconis,” she began, offering her hand to Luna, who shook it with a bemused look on her face, “It’s delightful to meet you in person. Your work with the Juilliard students is incomparable; students who take one of your courses during their university tenure are four times more likely to land Broadway roles than those who hadn’t. And _The Phantoms of Manhattan_ was a masterpiece, I am personally rearranging my schedule so that I can squeeze in another performance.”

Luna blushed, she loved compliments, and it didn’t take an empath to feel Ms. Potts’ sincerity. “It’s Luna, please, Ms. Potts, only my students call me Professor. It’s very nice to meet you, too.”

“Pepper then, please, ‘Ms. Potts’ belongs in the boardroom, not here in your beautiful home. But speaking of homes, it would be rude of me not to greet your roommate.” She turned to me and offered her hand once more. “Ms. Suero, or do you prefer Ueno?”

I shook the CEO’s hand with a small amused smile hovering around the corner of my mouth; I hadn’t decided whether or not I was going to let it bloom into a full smile. “I’m not sure there’s ever been anyone who knew enough to ask that question. As such, I actually have no preference. Though, in the interests of politeness, my name is Rin. Please, have a seat, can we get you something, Ms. Potts; tea, coffee, water?”

“It’s Pepper, and tea, please, if it’s not a bother—“

“Please, don’t finish that sentence. Water’s already hot, and Rin and I, we’re the old fashioned type. It’s all part of being a good hostess and what not,” Luna said, already halfway across the room, “Type?”

“I’m sorry?” Pepper looked perplexed, brow furrowed ever so slightly as she sank gracefully into one of our armchairs.

“Type of tea. We’ve been subsisting on tea more than usual, what with the push to get _Phantoms_ up and running. We have an entire pantry just for tea, what can I get you?”

“Breakfast in Paris? Dash of milk and one sugar, please.”

“Done. Rin?”

“Sencha green, thank you, darling.” Luna shot me a thumbs up and went off to make tea. I sat down across from Pepper Potts and within a few minutes, Luna brought the tray and served out three different kinds of tea before settling down herself. For a few minutes, nothing was said as we enjoyed our tea, but then Luna and I shared a look before setting our cups down in sync, the clink of china ringing with all the finality of a gavel. Something Pepper obviously picked up, because she too laid her cup aside.

“Truth time, is it?” She asked, rhetorically, we all knew what was going to happen next. Pepper reached into her purse and pulled out a cream colored envelope which she handed to Luna. Luna, in turn, opened it and scanned the contents. Whatever she’d read, it made her frown as she passed it to me.

“What is this?!” Luna inquired, tone too carefully modulated to not be hiding her irritation. A sentiment I could only agree with when I realized what I was holding was a handwritten invitation to dinner in Avenger’s Tower. I put the paper down and raised an eyebrow. This was beginning to look a little like a setup. And that was just not okay.

“Quite frankly, it’s a plea for help.” And then of course, she said the one thing that would make us at least listen, Luna as the Dreki who can’t really refuse anyone asking for help, and then me who was at very least curious. Luna leaned forward, her concern evident and I sat back, intrigued but not quite willing to admit it. I made ‘continue’ gesture and Pepper let out a sigh; she obviously hadn’t been optimistic about her chances that we’d get here. With that long breath, I also realized how jumbled her thoughts had been because they suddenly slowed down and became more like words and not the white noise I’d previously thought. Apparently, I was getting better at not listening; so much so that there were moments that I almost forgot I was a telepath. _Almost_.

“First, I’ll begin with my most sincere apologies.” At our puzzled looks, Pepper elaborated, “The events earlier this week. If I’d been in country, then perhaps your first official meeting with prof—Luna’s Soulmates might have gone very differently. I managed to pry the whole story out of Steve and Tony, and so the attempt at blackmail, well. My apologies aren’t enough, but they’re all I’ve got.”

“And thus we come to the part where I came to plead for your help. Since they left here, things have not gone well. Tony is, he’s being Tony, getting more and more wrapped up in his work, not eating or sleeping, and drinking, I’m worried for him. The others are no better; Steve’s barely left the training rooms in days, the number of punching bags he’s broken is astronomical; Loki is . . . . plotting something, I won’t even ask; and Thor, he’s the worst.”

“What’s he doing?” Luna asked grudgingly when Pepper stopped.

“Nothing. He is literally doing nothing. In the time I’ve known him, that man, god, warrior, he is never still. He is never not doing anything, but right now he’s moping. Nothing I say, or any of the rest of the Avengers has tried is working, on any of them. In many ways, this visit is my ‘Hail Mary’, my last resort. Would you please come to dinner and at very least get Tony off the floor of his workshop? By any means necessary, I honestly don’t care how.”

Luna and I shared a long look. We didn’t even have to say anything, aloud or telepathically. This was her call, and I’d back her regardless of her choice. Then Pepper offered one final enticement, “It’s Italian tonight, if that affects your decision any.”

Luna smiled and turned back to our guest, “We’ll come for dinner. Free food, in Avengers Tower, I’m down for that. The invitation said six?”

The relief on Pepper’s face was plain. “Yes, dinner’s at six, but if perhaps you could come a little early to get Tony off the floor?”

“We’ll be there by say, five then? Just to be safe. You didn’t tell them you were coming here?” I offered, now willing to be a part of the conversation. When Pepper shook her head, I continued, “Don’t tell them. We’ll surprise them; knock them out of their funk. Is it dinner with all the Avengers?”

“No, I don’t think so. Sam’s at a V.A. conference, he’s not due back for another two days. Bruce isn’t leaving his lab for the moment what with Tony being, well, Tony. And I’m not sure where our resident spies are actually.”

“Ah. Very well then. Do you want us to use the front door?”

“Pardon?” Her face at the non sequitur! 

“Please, I sincerely doubt you of all people don’t know who and what we are. Using the front door would be a courtesy, I’m asking whether you’d prefer we us it? Otherwise we’re liable to just drop in and set off who knows how many alarms, unless I hack them first.”

“Rin’s not actually trying to be rude, I promise.” Luna stepped in, a habit she was used to when it came to me. Intensity and awkwardness didn’t always make for pleasant interactions with most people. “She’s just asking a legitimate question, given our situation and who and _what_ we are. Something I, or rather we, think you must know by now.”

“I would prefer you use the front door, if you please. The alarms don’t need testing right now.” Pepper returned diplomatically, “I’ll see you both for dinner then?”

“We’ll be there.”


	12. Yelling solves nothing, but it certainly can get a point across

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As promised, the ladies scrape Luna's idiots off the floor and Rin gets a surprise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lookie, lookie, two chapters at once! See, I try to make things right when I make a mistake!

At five to five, we rolled up in front of Stark Tower in Luna’s beautiful, bright red Lamborghini Centenario LP 770-4. And then from the parking garage and into the elevator and then we were on our way. 

J.A.R.V.I.S. must have been expecting us because the doors closed and the elevator started without us pushing a button. Flicking my eyes to the ceiling, I spotted the tiny, well-concealed camera in the corner. Smiling, I said, “Hello, Jarvis.”

“Good evening, Ms. Suero, Professor Draconis,”

“It’s nice to meet you, finally.”

“As near as I am capable, the feeling is mutual. And now that you are here, and presumably here to see Mister Stark, can it be assumed that there will be no more hacking of my servers from here on out?”

The smile on my face morphed into a smirk and I replied, “No promises, we’ll see how things go.”

I would swear that Jarvis sounded more amused as he answered, “Yes, we will.” And the elevator continued its smooth ascent to the higher levels.

I looked away from the camera and found Luna staring at me, eyes wide, jaw hanging open. “What?!”

“Were you just flirting with an A.I?”

“No, I was flirting with Jarvis.”

“And I suppose that makes all the difference?”

“Doesn’t it?” (And Jarvis must have been paying attention because perfect timing, the doors ‘whooshed’ open and out of the elevator I stepped.) “Aren’t you coming? I’m pretty certain we’re here to scrape at least one of your Soulmates off the floor.”

Luna’s grumbling behind me was practically music to my ears as Jarvis subtlety guided us down the correct corridor in order to reach Stark’s lab. (We would later learn that he had to take us in the back way because of the programing that locked the main doors, plus it gave us a chance to sneak up on the silly scientist. (Drunk Science! is not as fun as it sounds after all. Or at least, it isn’t usually.)

We found Stark sleeping, or more precisely passed out on the floor of his workshop, mostly empty bottle of something in his hand. Luna looked at me and I held up my hands. “Your Soulmate, this one’s on you, unless otherwise asked.” I walked past her, carefully picking my steps over Stark and the detritus on the floor. “But, this,” I plucked the bottle from the man’s limp grasp, “the least I can do is get rid of this—phew! He must be upset; I didn’t think Mr. Playboy Philanthropist even owned a bottle of booze this cheap. Although,” I straightened up, tossing the bottle in a nearby trashcan, “I think you’ve got a great opening right here.”

“Oh?” Luna asked, voice lilting slightly, interested despite herself. 

“He’s dreaming, and I do mean _dreaming_. Are you listening? Because if you could feel what he’s feeling that corresponds with _those_ thoughts, well, you’d be as red as the Iron Man armor.”

Luna did, then predictably blushed, and then grinned evilly. "Watch this!" she said, hiking her skirt up before straddling his prone form and then pulled an ice cube from thin air and slipped it between her lips. With the ice cube in her mouth, she rolled her body against Stark’s, and then began to run the ice cube up his neck. When he began to come around, Luna nipped him, just a sort of ‘nope, not a dream feeling’. Still mostly out of it, one of Stark’s hands landed on one of my friend’s legs. Eyes still closed, the poor bastard frowned and awkwardly patted her thigh. But when Stark moved his hands to grab hold of Luna’s hips, Luna jumped to her feet. "Welp! Off to dinner!" she said brightly, Cheshire cat grin spreading wide over her face.

Stark blinked up at us blearily, one hand still grasping uselessly at the air where Luna had been while he scrubbed his face with the other. “Wait, what? What just—where are you going? Come back—”

“Nope, sorry, I'm not going to take advantage of a drunken man.” Luna patted Stark on the head and then quickly adjusted her skirt, using just a little magic to get rid of the wrinkles.

Genius on the floor was drunk, but not that drunk because even as he sat there, his expression shifted from the drunken haze to just an expression of actual confusion. “Wait, where are you going? Take advantage! By all means!”

“Nuuuuu. Dinner, I’ll be going to go do that now. Bye!” Luna waved and sashayed out the door.

I shook my head, to think, I used to be pretty sure I was the dramatic one in our relationship. But the writer versus the actor, well, that can be a tough call to make. But in this case, I’d have to shift back to being the sensible one for a bit. “I’m not in the habit of giving free advice. And we both still have legitimate reasons to be pissed at you, but you’re obviously hopeless so here’s your one freebie: make this right—shower, change, and be better than halfway sober by dinner.”

As I turned to follow after Luna, Stark asked from the floor, “So if I need more advice, what’s the price?”

Smirking, I replied, “Haven’t decided yet,” and walked out the door.

***

“You know, if I didn’t know you as well as I did, I’d have almost thought you were on my side of the slash, what with that little stunt back there.” I commented when I caught up with Luna outside the elevator. “But then again, you are so channeling me, what with the sheath dress, killer heels, and hair pinned in a tight bun—color scheme aside, we are doing a ‘twin’ thing, oh if the papers could only see us!”

Luna elbowed me, or tried to as we stepped into the elevator, and muttered, “Alright, so there’s one non-subby bone in my body, the ‘dangle things just out of reach and smile like an angel while doing it’ bone. Happy yet, you bloody sadist?”

“Not currently bloody, not yet.” I replied, deliberately misunderstanding. Luna glared, I smiled, and then we were both laughing like idiots. “So,” I said when I caught my breath, “who do we roust next?” 

“Probably the Capsicle, if Pepper’s right and he’s been down in the gym or the training rooms for the better part of the week, he’s going to seriously need a shower.”

“Alright then. Jarvis, if you please?”

“Certainly, Miss.” And away we went. The elevator door opened with barely a sound, not that we would have heard it over the frenetic sounds of skin hitting leather. (What? It’s a very distinctive sound, okay?) Luna and I looked at each other and stepped in, each hovering slightly over floor so as not to catch our heels on any matting on the floor. (Plus everybody knew that street shoes were not allowed in the gym).

Following the sound, we found the sad popsicle of a supersoldier, beating the shit out of a punching bag. After several long minutes of admiring the view, (hey, not my Soulmate, but I’ve got eyes, and not even Luna can fault me for using them. Not that she’s paying attention to me, what with the view we were taking in?) but still the soldier didn’t notice us. Suddenly his moves sped up, and then with a resounding ‘Thud’, the bag flew off its chain and into the far wall. Head bent and breathing heavy, Rogers looked like hell.

Luna was moved to pity and spoke up, “As pleasant as that view was, you’re expected for dinner by six. If nothing else, the army should have taught you punctuality.”

I muffled some inappropriate laughter when that blond head shot up and he nearly tripped over himself turning around to see Luna, head tossed back, hands on her hips, the full nine yards. But Luna wasn’t done, she was on a roll, and all I could do was stand there and let her go, full steam ahead. “Because, I certainly know that the army didn’t teach you anything about tactics, Mr. Man with a Plan. If they had, then you certainly would have realized that nothing about your previous approach was subtle, helpful, strategically sound, or otherwise known as ‘good idea.’” (Oh shit, there went the air quotes!)

Luna continued, “As such, I am here only because of an invitation; hand delivered no less, for dinner, no more. And somehow, I have been further bamboozled into feeling some small amount of concern for you hopeless lot that somehow are my Soulmates. Luckily for you, food tends to make me feel more magnanimous. Also the fact that my interest in kicking your ass, collectively, is severely dampened by how unfair the fight would be in your current condition.” Luna brushed some nonexistent lint off her immaculate skirt, “So, dinner. Six o’clock, clean, presentable. Spit spot,” and then she once again flounced away. 

_Drama queen,_ I thought, shaking my head ruefully. Shoe was on the other foot now, normally she played John to my Sherlock, cleaning up after my unintentional blunders. Now, I was definitely feeling Watson-like, cleaning up after her very intentional actions. And the drama queen with a choreographer’s eye for symmetry means she’d be doing this two more times before we even made it to dinner. 

Rogers was still staring at the spot where Luna had just been. I rolled my eyes, this was just getting sad. “Yes, she was real. Yes, she’s actually here. Yes, you have another chance to make things right. Have I answered all the questions you couldn’t find the breath or brains to ask? Yes, I have. So run along, there was an implicit ‘don’t keep me waiting’ tacked on to the end of her last statement.” I left him still staring in my wake, following once more in the footsteps of my best friend, something I would lay money that I’d be doing a lot of in coming days, against my usual preference, but one sacrifices for one’s friends, don’t they?

***

Later, in the elevator, I side-eyed Luna, “So, now to the demigods. Which one first?”

“Probably, Thor-eal. If he’s moping, he also is likely in need of a shower. If we bother to come for dinner, then they can damn well look like they give a fuck.”

“But who would they give it to? Certainly not you and obviously not me.”

“What?!”

“I thought you didn’t like it when people said that around you?” (Yes, I was on a roll. Yes, I’m terrible. No, I’m not sorry).

“Don’t make jokes when I’m trying to be serious!”

“Sirius died in the fifth book—spoiler alert!”

“You’re terrible!”

“I know.” I smiled gleefully at Luna who couldn’t even look at me, even while the corners of her mouth began to twitch. I counted it as a win. “Jarvis, where can we find Thor Odinson?”

“Master Thor is currently in his quarters, as is Master Loki, on this same floor as I am sure that would be your next question?” ‘Whoosh’ went the doors.

“J-man, you are wonderful, you know that?”

“I’m sure the sentiment has been expressed before.”

“Master?” Luna dead stopped and wavered, fanning herself with one hand, “Oh my . . . “

I turned back and pulled my floating (again) bestie out of the elevator. “Come on, honey, can’t channel me when you’re floating. Also before that title should get you, they gotta earn it. Just because they’re pretty, doesn’t mean that you lower your standards!”

“Right, right, I’m good, I’m real good, everything is perfectly fine. Soulmates, where they at? I gotta, gotta . . . yell, that’s right! I’m yelling at them!”

“Oh boy,” I muttered to myself as we came to a stop in front of the door that Jarvis had led us too. 

Luna pounded on the door, “Hello-oo! Wake up! Stop moping! I did not just get up and get dressed to have you not show up for dinner! Thor-eal!” There was significantly more shouting, but I started to tune Luna out, the one-sided shouted conversation wasn’t _that_ interesting.

A door slammed open, just down the hall, “Who makes such racket?!” Long, lean, and emo stormed out of his room. He stopped in his tracks so abruptly I half imagined he’d pulled something—but he’d just caught sight of Luna. “You!”

Luna turned and smiled brightly, and just a little maniacally, “Me! Oh good, you’re here. Wake your lunkheaded brother’s ass up and make sure you both are clean and presentable for dinner by six! No excuses!”

A soft sound and the Thunder god himself peered sadly into the hall. By Zeus’ beard! It is not okay for a man that size to have puppy eyes! Puppy eyes don’t even do anything for me, but why does he have them?! Luna caught sight of him and nearly lost focus, and he himself suddenly straightened up upon catching Luna’s gaze. Luna rolled her shoulders back and pointed in the prince’s face, “Listen up, Goldilocks; clean, dressed, and at dinner by six. Got it? Good.” And once again, she strode out—and I was so glad this was the last time.

“I’ve been doling out one free piece of advice, against my better judgement, to both the other morons who ended as Soulmates to my best friend, so it looks like it’s your turn, and what a pity, you’re both together, you’ll end up with the same advice.” I rolled my eyes; these idiots needed all the help they could get. “Take this chance while you can to make things right, because there may not be another. Clean, presentable, and at dinner by six—she’s not going to want to see you a minute sooner than that, so take the full amount of time to look your best. Pretty tends to make her feel more magnanimous. So does food, actually. Oh look at that, you got two pieces of advice for the price of one, aren’t you lucky?”

***

“Well, that didn’t take as long as I thought it was going to.” Luna stated as we wandered down another hallway. “Now what shall we do?”

“I’m not sure,” I began, then stopped and looked up at the ceiling. “What do you think? Any suggestions?”

“Rin? Who are you talking to? Jarvis, is she talking to you?”

“No, Professor, I do not believe so.”

“Rin, please don’t tell me you’ve lost it.”

“The better question is did I ever ‘have it’? Besides, you’d know the answer yourself if you were listening.” Luna looked at me and then at the ceiling and then back again, looking puzzled and very concerned.

“Well, it looks like I’ve been found out.” A muffled voice suddenly responded. And then panel in the ceiling opened up (one that I don’t think actually was supposed to open) and Clint Barton somersaulted out, landing lightly on his feet next to us.

“Oh! You could have just told me you were talking to Biceps!”

“Biceps?” Poor Clint, he was vacillating between confusion and glancing down at his own arms.

“Yeah, we’ve got a thing for nicknames and pet names. Biceps isn’t exactly imaginative, but it is accurate, you’ve got fantastic arms.” Oh boy, now I did it, the barest trace of a blush was beginning to climb up his face. (And I was so okay with that.)

But then his inner snark reasserted itself and he quipped, “Shall I stand here like this,” he shifted to a stereotypical body builder pose, smirking the whole time, “to make up for our disastrous first meeting?”

A smile quite unbidden crept across my face and Luna muffled a most undignified sound. We couldn’t help it; Clint was funny. “Well, I’m sure there’s blame to be had on both sides in our case. In retrospect, given your background, having ‘birdboy’ scrawled on your skin can’t have been pleasant.” I was feeling a little bad about that one, these last few days of sulking also meant I had a lot of time to argue with myself. And lose.

“When they started calling me Hawkeye, things suddenly made more sense, but it was interesting to say the least. On the other hand, a patronizing dismissal of your abilities wasn’t one of my smarter moves, and I’ve made plenty—Nat would tell you—but perhaps, we could start over?” Clint straightened and offered his hand.

I looked for a long moment at his outstretched hand before I reached out and took it. Even I’m not that petty. “I think I’d like that,” I said, still smiling, “Since we we’re introduced properly, my name is Rin Suero and this is Luna Draconis, Soulmate of four of your idiot teammates.”

“Clint Barton, it’s a pleasure to meet you both,” he returned, shaking both our hands and then gesturing to himself, “Well, do I pass muster? Am I allowed to come to dinner?”

“Was that blanket permission to check you out?” Luna blurted out, and then clapped a hand over her mouth because that was bad, even for us.

He just laughed and gestured to _all_ of him again, and so in this instance, we took that as permission given. Collared shirt, sleeves rolled up, buttoned vest and dark wash jeans—I certainly had no problems with it—and then I realized I’d said that last part aloud. For a brief moment, I thought about being embarrassed, but then I remembered that no, that’s exactly how I act, there was no point in being embarrassed. Clint’s little smile told me that he certainly wasn’t opposed 

“I overheard you telling _her_ Soulmates to be presentable for dinner,” Clint gestured at Luna, “I kinda figured that rule was for everyone.”

“Well, if it is, neither of us would complain.” Luna and I laughed and then looked back at Clint. “You’re more than welcome at dinner; we certainly can’t stop you from eating in your own home. But, you might do us a small favor?”

“Oh?” he asked, his curiosity piqued.

“Would you consider playing the part of the gentleman and escort us to dinner? I’ve a mind to piss off my Soulmates and this would do quite nicely—making a fuss about dinner and then strolling in on another man’s arm—wouldn’t you say?”

“It would be my pleasure,” Clint returned, sweeping us an old-fashioned bow and then offering us each an arm. “But since we’re trading favors, might you both do one for me?”

“Fair is fair,” I said, “What’s going on?”

“Since you both were kind enough to scrape Tony off the floor, maybe before we stroll on in to dinner, we could swing by and coax Bruce out of his lab?”

“Aw, you’re sweet,” Luna said, a sentiment I could find no fault with. “That’s hardly a favor; it’s just being a decent human being. This is his home too; he shouldn’t have to hide just because Stark and the others are being overly dramatic assholes. Of course we’ll go.”

The three of us headed to the elevator and down to what we were informed was the Mad Scientists’ Lair(s), or otherwise the R&D levels. Clint had us stop outside of one set of closed glass doors, “Bruce’s private lab. He hasn’t really come out for a while, mostly because with Tony on one of his benders, well.” Clint shrugged, there wasn’t much her could say without sharing things that weren’t his place, a feeling and a thought that Luna and I both picked up on.

“It’s all fine, no worries. But let’s get him out of there, it’s almost time for dinner, and we did tell her boys not to be late,” I said easily, smoothing over what could have been a very awkward conversation if we had been anyone else.

“Jarvis, patch me through, please.”

“Of course, Mr. Barton.”

“Hey, Bruce, it’s Clint. Dinner calls, Italian tonight. Plus, you know, we’ve got guests, ones who just scraped Tony and the others off the floor. And after all the time’s they’ve come to our assistance, a proper introduction might be at least polite.”

It was quiet for a long minute and what sounded like a sigh from the other end of the com. Then a door opened on the far end of the lab and out the good doctor stepped, crossed the long room to the other side of the glass doors, and exited his lab. “Doctor Bruce Banner, you might remember Luna Draconis, she came and got us in China, and also the Soulmates of our previously moping teammates?”

“I apologize, but my memory of that rescue was just a little hazy.” The doctor took Luna proffered hand with a polite smile, “But it’s very nice to meet you, officially.” They shook hands and Luna murmured a pleasantry. 

“And this is Rin Suero, the secondary force behind our rescue and my Soulmate.”

And then of course, because I’m me, what came out of my mouth was, “Well, hello there, Doctor Sexy. I am so pleased to meet you.”

The hand he had been politely extending to me dropped and then the doctor ducked his head and blushed. Peering up at me shyly through stupidly long eyelashes, he said yet more familiar Words, “Well, um, you certainly know how to make a first impression, don’t you?”

 _Oh my God . . ._ I thought as I heard my internal Soulmate counter click up one more: 2/5.


	13. "Where got’st thou that goose look?”

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin and Luna finally make it to dinner with the majority of the Avengers (and Pepper because she's wonderful) and they throw sass and shade all over the place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm back! And this is all Luna's fault! I didn't mean for it to be this long since I posted, nor how long this chapter is. But since I did make you wait, here it is; all 3500 words of it! 
> 
> Chapter title is from Macbeth, Act 5, scene 3
> 
> Catch all mt references! Go on, do it!

Our frozen tablau was broken by Luna’s positively delighted giggling. “Holy shitballs! This explains _so_ much!” She actually had the audacity to clap her hands to her face and give me one of those toothy, squished cheek smiles, the ones that simultaneously say ‘I told you so’, ‘that’s too adorable’, and ‘ehehehehe’ all at once. “Y’all are positively the poster children for PTP Goals.”

I blinked. And then again. (Why does nothing out of that woman’s mouth make any sense to me?) _PTP . . . goals?_ I thought, when I could make my brain function again (it was only like two seconds, but still an eternity for someone like me).

_Well, you can't be an OTP, but you CAN be a PTP, or poly true pairing, which I just made the fuck up, because I'm that fucking brilliant._

_BAM._

_Ooooh, Sassy Dragon be out in FORCE today!_ Luna still had that insipid grin on her face. 

_Dear gods, what horror have you wrought in the form of this best friend I have been cursed with?_ I thought, rolling my eyes heavenward under half-closed lids. Nobody answered but I could almost guarantee that Heimdallr was laughing at me. 

“Shut up, Luna,” was all I said out loud, there would be time enough to explain the whole telepathy thing later . . . much later. 

Poor Bruce. Poor Clint. Both of them were so confused. Well, that and they were both eying each other oddly. After all, it must not be every day that you realize you have a Soulmate in common. Looked like it was up to me to at least get us moving along.

Except I’m awkward as fuck. “So . . . Soulmates. Well, shall we away to dinner . . . with Luna’s Soulmates?”

 _That_ earned me a look from all three of them. I was so very glad that I am actually physically incapable of blushing because yeah, no. This one was bad, even for me. But fake it ‘til you make it right? Head high, no fidgeting, nothing for anyone to call me out on—well, unless that anyone was Luna, but for once, bless her heart, she was just going to let it alone. 

“We’re going to be late,” I tried again when no movement was forthcoming. _That_ seemed to do the trick. 

“Right, dinner!” Luna agreed. “Won’t do to be late, can’t have that.”

Clint turned on his heel and offered his arms up to both Luna and myself again. We resumed our former positions, hands curled loosely over Clint’s biceps, and me resisting the urge to squeeze because there would be time enough for that later. But before we took a step, I twisted back around and offered my free hand to Bruce. 

Two Soulmates, two arms, two escorts for me; this seemed a logical train of thought. But the look on the doctor’s face. By the gods, the way he looked. It was as if he couldn’t make up his mind how to react; like my outstretched hand was a cobra, reared back and prepared to strike; or, almost more tragically, like he didn’t know what to do, as if the idea of someone wanting to hold his hand was foreign, alien. 

(He shook Luna’s hand, so it can’t completely be a touch thing right? Or maybe it’s the Soulmate thing? Or just the fact that handshakes as part of greetings have specific parameters for that social/physical interaction, and most people have crappy handshakes, therefore minimizing the whole touching thing? I hate arguing with myself, I can’t win, no matter which way you look at it.)

I vigilantly kept out of his thoughts, did my utmost to ensure that I _heard_ nothing, and then did it again because I didn’t want to hear Clint’s thoughts, or even Luna’s in this moment, though I could feel the weight of their eyes on the back of my skull as they both were carefully making sure that they _weren’t_ watching. 

I’m not naturally inclined toward gentleness, but this time I tried. “It’s an offer.” I said softly, “One you can refuse. And your refusal, or acceptance, does not affect the chances of me offering again at a future time. Or if you wanted to initiate—“ Shit, I was not prepared to have to awkwardly have a consent talk with my newly discovered Soulmate, in front of one of my other Soulmates, and my best friend, while standing in the middle of a deserted lab in Avengers Tower. 

Bruce’s eyes flicked back and forth between my hand and sort of, almost, not quite able to meet my eyes for a long minute before he shook his head in this minuscule, aborted movement. Then when I moved my hand—all I did was lower it!—he flinched. For what was not the first time, nor would it likely ever be the last, I felt an icy, murderous rage fill my heartless chest cavity. Thank God for my impenetrable poker face and my years of practice at hiding my feelings, however few they were, because not even Luna could tell how close I was to committing mass homicide. 

Instead, I finished the movement and brought my outstretched arm back to my side and smiled again. “Dinner?” I asked, inclining my head towards the elevator. Bruce nodded, adjusted his glasses, and then fell almost in step with us as we heading into the elevator. And if I smiled slightly wider when Bruce actually stood next to me in the elevator instead of keeping his distance as I assumed was his wont, well, the only one to know was Jarvis, and he wasn’t going to tell.

***

The doors ‘whooshed’ open and out of the elevator we stepped, myself and Luna as regal as Queens with Clint as our gallant escort and with Bruce trailing just behind my shoulder, likely looking the quintessential image of the faithful retainer. Needless to say my author brain loved this image, which, when I remembered, I’d have to ask Jarvis for a still of this moment for later. 

Heads turned when we walked in a room, but not even I was selfish enough to imagine it was for me. The looks on the faces of Luna’s Soulmates, cross between bitchface, betrayal, and constipation. _Don’t you dare laugh,_ whispered though my mind, _if you laugh then I will, and that’ll spoil everything!_

 _Oh do shut up, Luna,_ I snarked back, not a single twitch of my face giving me away. _You’re being pedantic, of all people you think **I** would spoil this moment for you?_

Luna ‘harrumphed’ at me in her head even as she smiled prettily and thanked Clint for being such a gallant escort (okay, maybe Luna’s theater kid-ness meant that she’d also acknowledged the image we’d given off when entering the room) and excused herself to say hello to Pepper. 

I gave Clint’s bicep a brief squeeze, just because I could and smiled at him and Bruce. “Thank you for indulging us. The look on their collective faces was so worth the extra drama this is going to cause. Now, I too better go thank Pepper for the invitation, so the two of you had better Ro Sham Bo it out to figure out which one of you is going to sit next to me, because I can’t allow Luna to be sandwiched by silly Soulmates on both sides.”

I let go of Clint and crossed the room to stand behind Luna while she and Pepper finished greeting each other. They’d gone full out with the double hand clasp and air kisses to both cheeks, both sarcastic and gracious all at once. Which meant of course, I had to do the same. Can’t have Luna showing me up. Besides, given my usual touch aversion, as Luna well knew, every so often I have to do something out of character in order to keep her on her toes. So we were gracious, thanking Pepper for the invitation and complimenting her shoes (which were a kick ass pair of Manolo’s so to be fair, the compliment was totally necessary). Pepper was equally so, thanking us for coming and for scraping four of the Avengers off the floor (though much more diplomatically put, because Pepper) and made pleasantries for a few minutes while studiously ignoring Luna’s four glowering Soulmates before excusing ourselves to our seats.

Thor perked up like an adorable puppy and pulled one of the two empty chairs next to him out for Luna. Bruce was smiling sheepishly and pulled the other one out for me. I smiled at Bruce and Luna stared at Thor, par for the course reactions for the both of us in many ways, but we did eventually sit down.

And then Thor started piling food on Luna’s plate without so much as a ‘by your leave’. “Just what do you think you’re doing?” Luna asked, just the barest hint of heat in her tone.

"You are a warrior, little soulmate. You must eat like one." I nearly bashed my head against the table, Luna hates high-handed tactics. She hadn’t even gotten to look at the table properly, let alone decide what she wanted. When her eyes began to glow, that was it, I was done. 

I grabbed the nearly full plate and held it out to Rogers. His bewildered expression quickly folded under the weight of my very effective ‘mal de ojo’ or evil eye as we’d say in Spanish. He handed his empty plate to me which I then put in front of Luna and glared at Thor. Luna took a deep breath and began serving herself some salad. 

“But, but, _leaves_ , why do mortal women do that?! Leaves are not proper warrior’s fare!” There was probably supposed to be more, but my glaring at him over Luna’s head apparently caused the words to die in his throat. This was apparently going to be an effective deterrent on at least two of Luna’s Soulmates—which was good, because then I could lend a hand as required. Luna’s still holding a grudge against them, so if any of them were at all interested in getting on Luna’s good side any time in the next millennium, they better learn to start taking their cues from me. 

“Can it, Goldilocks, a salad isn’t going to fucking kill you.” And then again, they could also take some of their cues from their Soulmate herself, but if that’s all they did, they’d still be trying to say hello to her in their eighties. 

There was a peculiar sound just then, not quite a ‘thump’ or a ‘clunk’. Looking down the table, I had to stifle a laugh. _I’m pretty certain that Stark just kicked Thor under the table. I didn’t think his legs were long enough to do that._

Luna overheard me and almost choked on her bite of salad. I hid my smile behind my water glass as Luna turned and glared at me. I looked across the table at Clint and wiggled my eyebrows—he also almost choked on a bite of garlic bread. Turning my head, I grinned at Bruce who hesitantly smiled back, but he was looking a little lost. I think he missed the whole kicking exchange. 

There was silence but for the sounds of cutlery hitting china for a few glorious minutes before Stark finally couldn’t keep his damn mouth shut. “So, do you want to explain to us why you came waltzing in on the arm of another man by any chance?"

Luna and I shared a look, but since I had my mouth full of some of the tastiest garlic scallop pasta I’d ever had, Luna spoke for the both of us. “Well, as you know, Clint over there is one of Rin’s Soulmates—“

“WHAT?!”

“Oh, I hate it when you say that! . . . Wait, you didn't notice? Oh, right, you don't have an eye for subtlety... Or anything else, for that matter. So, let’s make this really simple. Me,” She held her hand over her heart, then indicated with her other hand at the four Avengers sitting on that side of the table, “Soulmates.”

She then put her hand on my chest, because we have no conceptions of boundaries, and I had to stifle an undignified sound. Pepper, Luna, and I were a bit outnumbered by the red-blooded males in the room, and almost every single one of them froze, forks, halfway to their mouths, and one by one their food dropped and ‘splatted’ back on their plates (except Stark’s, his somehow landed in his (water?)) glass. “Rin,” and then indicated Bruce and Clint, “Soulmates.” Me? I just looked at Luna’s hand, basically on my breasts, shrugged, and went back to eating. This was nothing new. She did eventually put her hand down (somehow not noticing the staring) and retaking up her fork, Luna muttered, “Though she’s still missing a few.” 

A few more long minutes later, it finally occurred to Luna that the silence around her was not in fact due to people stuffing their faces. Teeth still embedded in her garlic bread, Luna glanced around her, saw every male in the vicinity staring, though Bruce was being polite about it, and then Pepper and I smirking, and so, predictably, Luna blushed. Ducking her head and chewing furiously, Luna hid behind her drink, before clearing her throat, and deliberately turning her back on her Soulmates, she asked Clint with surprisingly steady voice, “So, Biceps, explain something to me, yeah?”

“Fire away.”

“You ducked out of the air vent earlier and well, we, I—no! I meant _we_ ,” because any chance to throw me under the bus with her, Luna will take it, “How come you’re not covered in dust or dirt or whatever? I mean, it’s not like people clean their air ducts—wait, stop, why are you people laughing?!”

The whole table was pretty much cracking up and now that the focus was off her, Luna’s bluish finally receded. Clint rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. “Funny how you should say that . . .”

And the whole table died again while Luna and I exchanged looks. When the laughter died down to gasping breaths and stifled chuckles, Clint continued. “The vents in Avengers Tower are actually pretty clean.”

“Why?” Luna asked, glancing around at the table.

“Well, um, it started because I lost a bet. With Tony.”

“Well, there’s your problem right there,” Luna quipped, apparently fully engrossed in this story. 

Stark took pity on Clint, or more likely just wanted Luna’s attention back on him (attention hog, it’d be funny if it wasn’t so tragic) and broke in with, “We were making bets on who would find their Soulmate first. I, obviously, won.”

Luna made a face. She wanted to hear the story but having Stark breaking in like that really threw off her groove. Luna helped herself to dessert, by which I mean she stole a cannoli off Stark’s plate, proceeded to ignore his outraged face by muttering that she’d ‘never had one before’, then continued ignoring Stark when he started squawking about the ‘inhumanity of a person living in New York and has never had a goddamn cannoli’ (“Language!”) and asked Clint, “So what did you have to do when you lost the bet?”

Clint shrugged, “Tony’s a lech, which you obviously know. Part of his image. Well, long story very short, I ended up in a stereotypical French Maid’s outfit, complete with feather duster made of real feathers.”

The table laughed again, except for me and Luna. We were staring at Clint, probably pretty intensely from the way his eyes kept flicking back and forth between us. “What?”

“And this relates to the clean vents, how?” Luna demanded.

“Because I spent most of the day hiding in the vents and decided that since I had the feather duster I ought to actually use it? What?!”

Rogers was blushing and laughing at the same time. “He kept complaining that the skirt kept bunchin' under his knees, so he had to shorten it!” Well, apparently not even Mister ‘I was born in the 1920’s’ was too phased by the dude in a skirt thing. Course, that might something to do with the neighborhood he grew up in, what with the flop houses and such.

We were staring again. “Please for the love of, well, everything, please tell me that you’ve still got that outfit?!” Luna asked intently.

Now _Clint_ was staring. “Why?”

“Because _I’d_ like it, that’s why.” I finally said. The whole table shut up. And fast. And now suddenly, _I_ was being stared at. “What’s with the looks? Great ass, nice legs, and a short skirt, what's not to like? Please tell me there were heels and fishnets?”

“Umnn, no?” Clint was blushing and now everyone seemed to be vacillating between staring at him and staring at me.

“Well, could there be next time? And if the outfit’s one of those cheap, icky things, would you consider letting me get you a nicer one?”

Thor dropped his (thankfully) empty (also thankfully) plastic mug (stein) on the table; Bruce was practically wheezing from stifling all his laughter; Rogers was practically purple; Stark’s mouth was hanging open; Pepper was politely giggling behind her hand (though the four glasses of wine she’d had may have (did) contributed to that); Loki was staring at us like bugs under a lens (again); Luna was smirking with me; and Clint was blushing again. 

“I’d wear fucking garters if you wanted.”

“Don’t tempt me,” I shot back. Then I thought about it, “Never mind, do tempt me”

“Rin!”

“What?! I’m Ace, not dead! Don’t tell me the aesthetic won’t be pretty.” I retorted to Luna.

Luna was about to respond when Stark rehinged his jaw and interrupted, again, “So when do I get to ask you to wear pretty things for me?”

Luna rolled her eyes. Now she was really done. “Possibly never if you keep this up!” She shot back at the genius. Then looking at me, Luna sighed. “Rin? I’m going, going ghost! Well, you know what I mean.”

I obligingly removed my napkin from my lap and held my arms partially up (elbows in so as not to accidentally hit Bruce) and waited. Luna transformed into a dragon, all black scales with a green shimmer to her wings, just slightly larger than the average house cat. She settled on my lap and the table exploded. Lots of yelling and scooted chairs and the whole nine yards.

I was scratching Luna and didn’t even bother looking up. “Oh come on, this should not be a surprise to you people. You don’t remember her transforming into a fire breathing lizard out over that airplane carrier in the Indian Ocean?” Luna twisted her head around and blew a mixed breath of smoke and sparks at me, which I just waved away—because honestly, that was the dragon equivalent of a raspberry and there is nothing threatening about a raspberry. 

Silence. I sighed, stood, and tucked Luna under my arm, like the villain does with their cat in like every spy movie ever made. Then I had a thought. “Hey, Luna? Before you fall asleep, I need a pillbox hat with some lace and shit. Then you can sleep all you want.” (grumble, grumble, grumble) But I got my hat!

“Jarvis, get some still shots of me, in profile if you please? And then if you could play with the lights so we could have some silhouettes that don’t show my face? And then email them to me? This would make a great cover for my next novel!”

“Certainly, Miss Suero.”

“J-man, you’re wonderful.”

I then looked back up at the assorted staring Avengers and began to pace back and forth, just a little in love with the picture I made. “So, since apparently I gotta educate the lot of you, listen up. This is Luna,” I scritched the dragon in question’s back and she began to purr. “She is a dragon. And magic. Also still prickly as hell over the whole Soulmate, Soulmark thing. And as should be relevant to you two Norse demigods over there,” I glared at them. “This is also a Dreki, figure your shit out. The rest of y’all can do your fucking research!” I kept pacing and scratching Luna, while the lights kept flickering and changing (and I steadily ignored Stark’s half spoken, half internal monologue about me corrupting his AI).

“And,” I continued, “this is all somewhat relevant to you people because if you find the appropriate bribing currency, I could be a wealth of information on how to make this bitch happy.”

There was muffled, derisive sound from the doorway. “Happiness is for children.” Or so the new voice said, seemingly unaware that those were yet more eerily familiar sounding Words.

I turned my head and looked the Black Widow herself in the eyes. I smirked. “Challenge accepted.” 

Her eyes widened just a fraction and I knew I scored a hit. And my internal Soulmate counter clicked up one more: 3/5.


	14. There is Flattery in Friendship

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin wakes up to a horrible, no good, very bad day. Or so it feels like, and then guess who calls? She is not amused.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You know, I'm just going to stop making promises I obvious have a hard time keeping. I'm not done with this story, so I'll always be back, but I'm going to stop saying that I'll be around when I obvious can't keep up. 
> 
> I _will_ however say, that aside from this chapter, I do have chapter 15 completely done and 16 mostly so, so hopefully, everybody cross your fingers for me, that I will be able to get those posted soon. Because if you've been with me from the beginning then you deserve better and if you've just discovered me, then you deserve to have an author who's at least a little consistent. 
> 
> Chapter title is Shakespeare once more (Henry V 3.7.102), Constable to Orleans
> 
> Also, let it be noted: THIS CHAPTER AND THE NEXT TWO ARE ALL THE FAULT/PRODUCT OF LUNA HOUNDING ME TO WRITE MORE. (She says, "You're welcome." by the way.
> 
> That is all.

_Why do spies have such loud brains?_ I wondered; it’s always been a curiosity of mine. Every spy I’ve ever met (or not met as the case usually was) has had an extremely loud brain. Presumably, it has something to do with how good they were at playing roles and keeping their thoughts to themselves that they compensated by turning the volume on their internal monologues up six notches.

But when I smiled at the Widow, hoping to offset the conflicting dialogue in her head that ran the gambit from, _”Wait, what?”_ to various scenarios of how she’d “manage” this “situation”, to going through any information she had on both Luna and myself; she regained her traditionally neutral expression, and then turned on her heel and left the room. Which was my cue to not listen as much as I possibly could—I’m pretty sure accidently reading your newly discovered Soulmate’s mind without permission was one of those “bit not good” things I should avoid doing. 

Clint seemed to be the first to recover from the whole “dragon” thing and he looked between Romanoff’s receding back and me several times before speaking up cautiously, “Wait. Did you . . . you and Nat?!”

“So it would appear.” I replied, still stroking Luna’s sleeping dragon form. I was half-tempted to wake her, because if this wasn’t a situation that required “girl talk”, then I didn’t know what was. But we’re insomniacs and I did just promise her she could sleep for as long as she wanted. 

And I _always_ keep my promises.

And now we’re being stared at again. Sort of. Collectively, it was as if the rest of them couldn’t figure out whether to stare at the Luna-dragon in my arms, or at me and the doorway where Natasha had been. Thor and Loki were both staring at Luna like Valhalla itself had just been opened before them—good, they damn well better be awed. Luna is fucking awesome!

I could hear the gears turning in Stark’s head, mild curiosity in the background while the rest of his brain ran a search to see if he knew what a Dreki was (and the whole, “how is that even possible?” science side. Dude, with all that’s happened recently, magic still surprises you?).

Rogers had forgone the “dragon” thing and was staring at the doorway going (to the effect of): _Nat = friend; friend sad = why friend sad?_ (As Luna would say, “Good egg.”)

Pepper poured herself a fifth glass of wine, saluted me with it, and then went back to her tiramisu. If anything that goes on in this Tower surprises her anymore, I’ll eat my hat! (Not really, it was a cute hat!)

Bruce was looking still somewhat puzzled, though being one of the resident geniuses in the room, he’d figured out what Clint had, and was more focused on the fact that I had three Soulmates—and he seemed to be the only one to remember that Luna had said I was missing a few. (Clever boy.)

There was so much I could say, so much sass, so many jokes, so little time. I even had one all lined up when I heard something. And I always have to check to see if that something was a something I heard with my ears or with my mind. I turned, casually sauntered over to the window, and stared out at the bright lights of the greatest city in the world. 

New York City, of course shit was going down. And the dragon was sleeping in my arms. Fuck me, my life, and every decision I’ve ever made which led to this moment. Because I always keep my promises. 

And I made one to Luna, a long time ago. Technically, under duress, but I made it. 

“On that note,” I said, turning back to the room at large, “I think I’ll take our leave.” 

I headed towards the door and Thor stepped in my path, effectively blocking my exit just due to his sheer bulk. “But you cannot leave now!”

And that was so not on. “You would dare hinder my forward progress? You reach into the past for the actions of the callow boy-king pretender to command me? When none of your actions to date have made my thoughts turn towards a kinder shore?”

I was prepared to go off on him—I certainly haven’t forgotten the whole “blackmail their way into my home thing” (And being insulting in formalized language was so much fun!). But then _Loki_ of all people, stepped in. Like literally, hand on Thor’s chest, pushed him aside, and stepped in front so he could talk to me.

“No discourtesy was meant. Thor merely wished to express his displeasure at being deprived of your company so soon. Unfortunately, diplomacy is not his strongest suit, but surely his sincerity is plain? We would extend our gratitude for your company this evening and would be delighted if you would grace us with your presence again in the future.”

“Ah, the silver-tongue strikes again!” I smiled and replied smoothly. From the looks on their faces, it was not a particularly nice smile. “I know that was meant for Luna and not me, but I appreciate the lie nonetheless. Gentlemen,” I nodded to Stark and Rogers, “Your Highnesses,” to Thor and Loki (they all fucking flinched, I felt so vindicated. No, I’m not petty in the slightest.) “Pepper,” got an actual smile because Pepper. “Soulmates.” They too got a real smile, which was returned. (Yes, I can do this Soulmate thing, I can, I can . . . well, I can once I actually have a conversation with Natasha Romanoff . . . and once I find the missing two (and there was something about that buzzing around in the back of my head, a sneaking suspicion of some sort that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. Later, there’d be time later).

I left the room and got us down the elevator, said goodbye to Jarvis because it would have been rude not to, and into the car and home in less than six minutes. Anyone who knows anything about New York traffic, even at that time of night will understand my pride in that accomplishment. 

I poured Luna into bed, suited up, and was out the door again in less than three minutes. I didn’t get back until dawn.

***

Approximately thirty-six hours after we left the Tower, I cracked open one eyelid at my ringing, antique alarm clock, took one look at the time, and without moving a finger, I threw it into the wall. The clock didn’t break (for those of you who care about how I treat my antiques) but the wall sort of, _dented_ a little. 

Luna pushed open my door as quietly as possible, and poked her head in. She looked at the wall, the clock on the floor, at me, and back again, then cautiously backed out, and shut the door without a sound, using just a hint of magic to ensure it.

Today was just one of _those_ days. One of those wrong side of the bed days, days when every breath felt _wrong_ , days when somebody even looking at you made you want to rip their heads off, days when while nothing might be actually wrong, nothing felt _right_. Days when telepaths just want to rip their brains out of their skulls using that tool that the Egyptians used to use to take the brains out of mummies, days when the world was just too fucking loud, even the barely registerable blip of Luna’s mind on my proverbial radar was too much. Cue the tension headache, migraine combination that medicine really couldn’t touch. All I wanted was to go back to fucking sleep. 

But as just about every insomniac knows, once you’re awake, you’re awake. Even if you’ve been awake for the better part of four days straight. Sluggishly, I pulled myself out of bed, grabbed my robe from the chair where I’d thrown it the other day, and then dragged myself out to the kitchen. Luna, bless her heart, has known me way too long. She had _**three**_ pots of tea floating above the kitchen island while she grabbed a couple of trivets, all while finishing up a call to our drywall connection. (Yes, we’re those “I have a guy (or gal) for that” people).

She finished up, said goodbye, and turned around just as I flopped myself down onto one of the stools, and dropped my head onto the counter. Luna set a big mug in front of me (well, technically it’s a beer stein, but held a whole pot of tea though, so give you one guess what we used that for), poured the pot of Irish Breakfast into said mug, the sugar in the raw stuff I like so much, and enough milk to change the color of the brew. Then she pushed the bakery box closer to my elbow after helping herself to one of the still warm croissants, and settled in with her own cup of tea. 

***

One and a half pots of tea, fifty-eight minutes, and three croissants later, I was feeling close to halfway human again. Luna, being the sweetheart that she was, kept up a running dialogue of mixed thoughts, peculiarities, songs, and movie quotes in her head so I could set up camp there and dull the edges of the rest of the world for a little while.

And then Luna’s phone rang. 

And maybe we’re becoming psychics too in our advanced age because unlisted number or not, we knew _exactly_ who was on the other line. 

We looked at each other, made faces, but Luna did answer the phone, on speaker because whatever it was, the likelihood of it _not_ also involving me was pretty slim. And if these last few weeks were any indicator, we’d pretty much given up on the possibility of things going our way. 

“Hello?” 

Silence for a beat, and then a bellowed, “ **AVENGERS ASSEMBLE!!** ” came through the speaker. 

I admit it; we flinched, just a little. Our penthouse has pretty good acoustics, and even though the speaker on her phone wasn’t great, we have particularly good hearing, and Iron Dude was loud. Then there was some brief scuffling and muffled, “Give me thats” followed by “Nos” and a couple “Make mes”, before Captain Star-Spangled-Pain-in-our-Ass got hold of the phone—though why they weren’t just patching us through their coms, I have no idea.

“Miss Draconis? Miss Suero? Stark shouldn’t have done that, he’s sorry. (“No, I’m not!” “Shut up, Tony!”) How long will it take you to meet us in Cairo?”

“Excuse you?” Luna said, doing an excellent job of keeping her voice level, trying not to exacerbate my headache any further. “Since when were we Avengers? I certainly don’t recall volunteering; and if I didn’t, then Rin certainly as hell didn’t!” As always, I was impressed at her ability to quiet shout. “And I’m almost afraid to ask, but _why_ is it necessary for us to meet you in Cairo? I’d say this would be a great first date attempt, but considering the last couple stunts ya’ll pulled, I’m not optimistic.”

Silence for a long minute as Cap obviously wrestled with how to answer, and then smartly decided just to go with the part that didn’t require a personal opinion. “S.H.I.E.L.D. had a jail break during a custody transfer to Interpol. Three hundred odd members of—“

More scuffling sounds and then (somewhat muffled) came Stark’s voice down the line, “That terrorist group in China, you remember them? The one you made like freakin’ Santa Claus to Fury? They’re out—well, mostly—whatever. A whole lot of them escaped and regrouped with another branch organization that S.H.I.E.L.D. just found out about outside Cairo, in the 6th of October satellite city.” More metal against metal sounds, a few grunts, and quite a few “Heys!” and then he continued, a little breathlessly, “Figured since you got yourselves involved last time, you might want an actual invitation, cuz I’m pretty sure party crashing is rude.”

“Wait, did you just blame us for saving you?! That’s our fault?!” Luna shot back, just a hint of smoke escaping her mouth. (I think if that were in my skillset, I would be too.)

“No, no, no, that’s not what he meant at all.” Cap was back (and far in the background, we heard Loki say what we would later swear to was, “Liar.”) “What he meant was that since you helped capture them before, that your assistance would be useful. We’re less than half an hour out; Tony’ll tell you the coordinates.”

“Excuse you?!” My turn. “Not going to happen. Nope. Today started off as a bad day, my head is pounding worse than twelve simultaneous, differing performances of Taiko drums, and this conversation has just made it worse. I am not stepping foot outside for at least the next twenty-four hours. ”

“But—“

“Nope. Fuck you and the horse you rode in on, Capsicle. The number you have reached is no longer in service. You heard the lady, we’re not fucking going—Soulmate or no Soulmate, Dreki or not, if Rin’s not going, then I don’t go. Can you even hear yourself?! We already gave S.H.I.E.L.D. that entire facility’s personnel—all four hundred and eight of them—giftwrapped even—but suddenly you lose them and now _we_ gotta find them?! Since when?—I was pretty certain Rin gave them everything they needed to shut this whole mess down!” When you’re not in the mood to yell, it was nice to have a dragon in your corner. Especially when she’s taking the words pretty much verbatim from your brain. She’d just taken another deep breath to continue what I’m sure was a spectacularly witty and loquacious tirade, when suddenly a new voice (somewhat tinny due to the distance the voice was from the phone) broke in.

“That’s it! You never get to use the phone again! Nat, take the controls a second? Thanks.” Muffled sounds of movement, “Now give me that.”

“Miss Suero, Miss Draconis? Unless I’ve got permission to be familiar?”

“Biceps,” Luna exclaimed, dialing back her irritation at the sound of our (current) favorite Avenger. “We’re both here, and yes, of course you silly thing, you can use our first names.”

“Oh good. Rin, Luna, I’m sorry, on behalf of those two idiots over there.” (Simultaneous “Heys!” and muffled chuckling.) “What I’m sure he meant, or at the very least what _I_ mean because I know how to give credit where its due, is thank you both for coming to our rescue when things went FUBAR. I’m honestly not certain how we would have escaped if not for your intervention.

“And now, I would like to politely request your assistance, on behalf of the Avengers Initiative, if possible, and apologize again, for calling so late as we’re only about fifteen minutes out from wheels down, but would you consider meeting us there?” I admit I was wavering, and Luna was already on her feet, and then he finished it off with the topper, “Please?”

My face contorted into several peculiar expressions as I thought things over. On the one hand, today bad day. On the other, Soulmate asking politely. Fuck me, I’m a sucker for politeness. I stood with a quiet sigh. Luna took that as all the incentive she needed, “Since you _asked_ nicely, then we would be happy to.” Luna and I will be the first to admit, we’re a little petty, but damnit! We do kinda need to be asked! (And the sooner that Cap and Stark figured that out, the sooner they could get to the part in their relationship where they could give orders (to Luna) and have them obeyed (mostly, when she’s not being just a little bratty). 

Yes, we were going. But none of this changed the fact that today was still just one of those days. And this conversation had done nothing to improve my mood. I smiled at Luna before turning on my heel to change. Luna’s corresponding expression was one of those nervous, wide-mouthed smiles that you only see when people are covering up a fear response. 

That expression was still on her face a few minutes later when she zapped us out.

*** 

We arrived on the outskirts the 6th of October minutes before the Avengers landed; we could actually see the jet over the horizon (surprisingly quiet; I guess Stark’s gotta live up to his reputation somehow. (Don’t tell him, he’d see it as a compliment and then I’d never live it down.)) Plenty of time to hack their security and figure out what we were dealing with in this series of interconnected empty, if not incomplete, looking buildings. This cell was being rather clever, hiding their activities in one of the less occupied satellite cities, well outside the main Cairo area. The not so clever part(s)?

A). They were _so_ not prepared for that jailbreak, in fact they were scrambling to find places for all their new members in their different assorted cells across the world, very businesslike. (Yes, I was keeping track of all the locations, though why I should be doing S.H.I.E.L.D.’s job, the C.I.A.’s job, MI-6’s job, etc. for them, I have no idea. (Probably because I’m an idiot.))

B). Somebody didn’t trust somebody to do their cybersecurity; I found _seven_ different layers of encryption done by seven different cyber security specialists of differing ability. Not to mention that none of these layers were all encompassing—I could ride a full sized dragon through these damn holes and still have room to spare. (Luna picked up on that thought from my head and doubled over laughing. I’m glad somebody was amused. I was too busy grumbling over the sloppiness and the lack of challenge.) 

Then the jet touched down on the sand, the hatch opened up, and Captain Tightpants (and I meant that literally, I wished I was in a better frame of mind to take advantage of that view) jumped out and totally tried to organize his troops, and us, once he saw we were already there, and I was just not having it. (I might have been more amenable to his tactical planning if today weren’t one of those days—I can feel you judging me out there!)

I stalked up to him, tablet at my side, and I pointed a finger in his face and went, “No.”

“No, what? I’m—“

“No. You,” and then I pulled my hand back to make a circling, collective gesture, “Perimeter.” 

I didn’t give him a chance to reply (but his bitchface was epic!) and I caught a glimpse of the Black Widow’s smirk just behind Cap’s shoulder before I pointed at Luna as I turned and headed towards the main building, “Babysit.”

I shoved my tablet in her hands as I passed. Luna looked at it and then held it out in front of her between two fingers, making such a face! Then my actions caught up with her and she went, “Oh, hell no! Bitch, where do you think you’re—“

I turned my head again and gave her the full force of my ‘you’re in for it now’ face, with a liberal helping of the ‘psychopath smile’. Luna dead stopped, took a minute to collect herself (I occasionally scare her), and inhaled deeply to go off on me, when I said one succinct word. “Catcher.” 

“Oh. _OH!_ ” Silence for a beat. “Gimli?”

No response from me, so she continued warily. “Gimli, remember, no killing. Remember we said—“

I flipped her off and kept walking. “Oh dear.”

The last thing I hear before I went inside was one of the Avengers saying, “You were kidding, right? She was kidding, wasn't she? That was a joke . . . wasn’t it?”


	15. Come Not Between the Dragon and Her [his] Wrath

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin is a psychopath and Luna is a dragon they make it work. 
> 
> And discovers Soulmates 4 and 5. 
> 
>  
> 
> _What is my life?_

_I love the smell of fear in the morning. Or afternoon. Or anytime really_ , I thought with a sadistic smile. The floor rumbled under my feet, the walls shook, plaster dust filled the air, and every window I passed, shattered, shards instantly becoming (near) deadly shrapnel. I get to thank my theater kid roommate for my ability to project because my laughter rang through the building. (Half seductive chuckle, half maniacal giggle—you know that one meme that goes, “Mark me down as scared and horny?” Yes, that one; I can do the laugh that gets _that_ reaction.)

“Here terrorist! Here, boy! Or girl, I’m not pick-y! Come and get me, bitches!”

Sideways flip, two legged kick. Roll midair like a bowling ball; four grunts with machine guns the pins. And every goon to go down, got flung through a conveniently already broken window and into Luna’s waiting arms.

Well, her giant magic baseball glove, like the one from the _Green Lantern_ comics?— _Oh yeah_ , (free run up the wall, then ceiling, land on idiot’s shoulders like a mechanical bull, go flat along his back, ignore the stumble, grab his shoulder and use his gun (upside down and shooting near backwards, take that bitches!) to drop five more members of the same cell, all flooding in through the same door. _Idiots._ )

_I didn’t want to come out today, gunfire doesn’t help my headache, and let’s not mention what plaster dust and desert sand is doing to my allergies, but not a bad way to spend a day. Even if Luna did say no killing. Harrumph. Nothing a whole lot of wanton destruction can’t cure!_

One-two punch combo, spin kick, dodge the idiot who thought knives in a fight with me were a good idea—swing said idiot by the wrist in a full circle (or two) to clear space. _I’m getting crowded here!_ then let him fly through the remnants of the window, screaming like music to my ears. Dodge bullet, take a kick to the thigh (avoid the kidney shot from the other side) just so I can (cheat using telekinesis) “bend” the one enemy’s gun into a bow, watch his eyes get big, and then kick his ass out the hole in the wall. (That one wasn’t my fault! Not completely. It was an unfinished building! It wasn’t completely stabilized yet; how was I to know that repeatedly throwing 200-something pound bodies against it would cause the wall to collapse?!)

Dodge, dodge, kick, forearm block, block, punch ( _OW! Punching Kevlar, bad!_ ), palm strike to the sternum, gasping dumbass became a brace, kick off, and slide across the floor, narrowly avoiding a hail of gunfire, knee-capping two with a one of their backup guns as I went by, flipped backwards to my feet, and swung a broken ceiling beam to hit the remaining three out of the park. 

I took a quick glance at my surroundings and abruptly stood up, sucking in a sharp breath as I did—that one kick hurt! The hall was empty, and the next nearest foe was . . . well, not close. I turned and headed for the hole in the wall. I could see the jet just over there to my far right; and then there was Luna, standing around the corner of a building just across the street, also taking a breather. She waved jauntily; I raised a hand back. I was going to ask, “So, how am I doing?” but Luna beat me to the punch. (Which was good since I didn’t feel like talking much anyway.)

“Nice one! Ninety-two out of the total of four hundred eleven in twenty-nine minutes. You’re on fire, Raven! The fliers are doing perimeter checks, the Trickster’s with them, Arrow and Wintermint are in prime sniping positions, the Hulk, currently not Hulk-ed out is standing by; but I think they’re all seriously bored. Their only excitement so far has been catching a few superstitious types who fled to get away from the ‘man in black!’” I muffled an amused snort (I can’t go inhaling much more of this dust!) “The Man with the Plan is doing a lot of staring every time you toss someone out the building and I catch them. Well, that and look disapproving when I shake ‘em down for weapons. But I think he’s finally realizing that maybe even your ‘go-in-with-no-plan-except-to-fuck-shit-up’ plans are pretty good.”

Which told me almost everything I needed to know except, “Where’s my—“

“Oh, right yeah. Spidey’s over here with me—really? Nothing, come on, I’m trying here!—she’s got your tablet. When I said ‘you got this’, she totally went along with it. I think if it were possible she’d kick back with a drink and watch you work. Badass!”

I dragged a hand over my masked face. “What have you been telling her?”

“Only the good things.” _That_ was not Luna’s voice. That was the Black Widow, my Soulmate.

“Secondary com line?”

“Close proximity, good hearing, and a loud friend.” (“Hey!”)

“Ah—“

“Incoming two, one floor down, heading for the north stairwell.” That was Luna again. “Wait, they’re headed . . . down?”

I reached out for a quick mental sweep and then sighed; I thought I was the dramatic one. “Widow, Smaug, clear the team and last minute evac, stat. They’re going to light it up.” Thank God for competent women because neither hesitated and off they went. 

Me? I made a mad dash for the control room. I couldn’t just let all that information just go up in flames (and if I had some harebrained idea that maybe I could stop the explosion or disconnect some number of the explosives to lessen the blast, well, that was no one’s business but my own). 

_Stereotypical villains and their bloody dramatic tendencies_ , I grumbled as I flew down the halls. _Yes, here, Control Room—mainframe and—SON OF A FUCKING GUN!!!!!!!!—overly-dramatic assholes went too fucking far this time. Who doesn’t put an off switch on a series of . . . oh fuck me! Of course they’re cascading detonations! Of course the fucking C-4 is wired into the damn foundations, of all the dick-shitting moves!_

I had to rehack the mainframe and set it up on a remote download to an offshore, black site server farm that I “borrowed” from the C.I.A. (using my faked S.H.I.E.L.D. access code (what!? I certainly wasn’t going to use my N.S.A. one!)). I’d ask the Black Widow— _Right, I gotta ask her if I can call her by her name Can’t be presumptuous. Wait, how did Luna get away with calling her ‘Spidey’?_ —maybe she’d like to hack it back for S.H.I.E.L.D.? 

_Right, back to the whole ticking time bomb thing. Remote download is taking place, not much point in staying here what with the evacuation of the cell . . . and the timer has less than two minutes on it. Might make that one explosive cache there in the center, could disrupt the continuity of the explosions, could even lessen the overall force. Then up and out, yeah, sounds like a plan._

***

Unfortunately, when I don’t think plans through, I get left smashing my way through ceilings with a bundle of C-4 floating next to me as a building exploded around me. _This was not one of my better ideas—oh, good, it didn’t explode too. I’m going to have to get Luna to get rid of this for me. We can give it to Cap later who can turn it over to some sort of governing body who could track its sale when they track down the rest of this cell’s branches?_

And then my thoughts were interrupted when I nearly collided midair with somebody some-I-don’-even-know-how-many-feet above the explosion. We each veered sharply to avoid the other and it only took me a fraction of a second to recognize the Falcon, Sam Wilson. And of course, because I was irritable as all anything today, what I said was, “Watch it! Learn to share the sky, flyboy!” 

He drew up, obviously startled, though I guess almost crashing into somebody at this height could do that to you. He opened his mouth to speak when mass movement out of the corner of my eye caught my attention. 

The cell, having now blown their facility, was apparently going to take to the streets and storm the city to increase panic. We couldn’t have that, a thought I could tell Luna concurred with. Which meant . . . it was time for another spectacularly bad idea.

 _Follow my lead!_ I thought at Luna as I held up a finger in a ‘wait’ gesture to the flyboy and dove back towards Earth to head the bastards off. 

_Don’t I always? You got a plan to keep them out of the city?_

_They’re going to chase us towards the desert and leave the civilians alone._

Luna didn’t bother to reply though she did as I indicated that she should take position at the far opposite side of the enemy force. If this worked, they should split and follow us back around the wreckage and towards the desert instead of continuing to march on the city. I took a position on a lamp post that didn’t get bowled over by the explosion, one foot braced, one hand holding on, a la _Singing in the Rain_ , ripped off my mask, and threw my head back (and thanked God that our bracelets were working again). “Yo! Bitches! Where do you think you’re going?”

I don’t know who was more surprised, Luna, the Avengers, or the very dipshits I was insulting. Then one of them from the back shouted, “The soldier from the mountains!”

I was about to compliment his Mulan reference when, I shit you not, _somebody else_ shouted, “That’s not her!” And then they began to argue over whether or not I was me. Nobody even took a shot at me, sitting duck and everything. What happened, no upper leadership types here?

Then Luna decided to get in on the action. To be fair, I had said to follow my lead. She leapt up on a pile of cars, ripped _her_ mask off, and hollered, “I’m actually over here!”

The fucking cell rioted and did just I’d planned (hoped); they split up, screaming threats and obscenities, and took off chasing either Luna or myself, with a group of seventy or so still heading for the occupied portion of the city, only to be met by the combined force of seven of the Avengers. (I trust I don’t have to tell you who I was betting on.) 

I didn’t have much time to think about it before I had to jump from my perch, roll to my feet, and run towards the open desert with approximately one hundred twenty terrorists on my tail. I contemplated levitating the whole way, but then I remembered that the whole point; they were supposed to feel like they could catch me. Otherwise they’d turn back to the city and the civilians. We were here helping the Avengers; civilian casualties were the exact thing we were supposed to be avoiding. Which reminded me, I had to make sure they’d _keep_ chasing me too. Turning my head slightly, I yelled back, “What’s the matter, slowpokes? Did you get fat and lazy in that nasty old S.H.I.E.L.D. prison? If you need a break, I can arrange a visit!”

The beast that was the mob howled with rage and few frontrunners tried to shoot and sprint at the same time. They missed, missed by so wide a mark that I took the time to run up the wall of a nearby building, shove off, and into a pile of rubble, then turned and began chucking loose pieces of debris at random. A few went down, but it served its purpose. 

The mob ran on.

I let them chase me probably less than a quarter mile from the last ruined building; theoretically just far enough away that the city had a safety net of sorts, still close enough to provide cover or backup as needed for the others. 

I made my stand under sinking sun, amid the still hot sand and let the beast come to me. 

Silly things ran at me, thinking I was tired or just remembering that they had me outmanned and outgunned. Heh. Sucked to be them. 

Just when I was about to create my own woman-made sandstorm, there was a flash of light and then a “Whoop!” as the Falcon decided to crash my party, dive-bombing away with a fantastic aerial twist, and a gun in each hand before he used the wings’ momentum to execute this really quite pretty full body flip-kick thing as the wings retracted back into his suit. He flashed me a smile before getting caught up in the fray. “Do you know,” he began, snapping off a quick shot and then blocking a poorly executed punch, “I joined the Air Force because of you.” The jerk had the nerve to say those familiar Words, half exasperated, half chucking, in the middle of a fucking firefight! 

My internal Soulmate counter clicked up one more: 4/5. Just one more to go, did that mean . . . ? _Later, fight first, think later._

“Seriously!?” I demanded while simultaneously roundhouse kicking some jackass in the face, “What kind of person says another’s Words in the middle of a fight?!” Block, dodge, kick, kick, elbow to the face (not mine!), stole his gun, and kneecapped three.

“You said yours while bustin’ out of an exploding building.” 

“Don’t you bring logic into this when I’m having a bad day!” I glared at him, and punched somebody in the face when he tried to sneak up on me.

“You and Red, that rule about never taking your eye off your opponent doesn’t apply to either of you, does it?” He was in the middle of a fight, with his newly discovered Soulmate who was covered in other people’s blood, plaster dust coating half her face, sand in her hair, in the desert, as the sun went down, and he was laughing! I thought only Luna and I laughed in the face of the ridiculous!

“JUST KISS HIM ALREADY!” Luna. That bitch. Like a half a mile away and barely visible against the sand as she and the Iron Dude went at the crew that had followed her, and she still found time to ship me and my newest Soulmate. 

“Well, I wouldn’t object.” Wilson flashed me another smile and then took three perfect cross body shots. I smirked and mouthed, “Later.” He laughed and had to dodge another badly executed kick. 

Then I turned back to the fight and screamed at the sky, “Smaug, if I have to stop in the middle of a fight to kill you, I will not be happy!” I swore colorfully in three languages when all Luna did in response was giggle. “If you’ve got time to make jokes, then you can hide this!” And I threw the unexploded package of C-4 at her. I knew it would never hit, but watching every foe in the vicinity duck for cover as it flew past them was hilarious. 

While they were distracted, both the Falcon and I headed skywards. “Keep them here while I check to see if any of the stragglers joined the fight against your team?”

“Please do. I think the explosion made the coms fritz out a bit. They should be easy enough to manage for a while if I’m airborne. Just don’t forget to come back. I can’t have just found you and then lose you again.”

“Cheeky.” I retorted and damn that man and his beautiful smile! I quick turned and headed back towards 6th of October before I did something foolish. 

***

Back near the ruins of the base, I found that the fight wasn’t as quite over with as mine and Luna’s were. What else do you do but jump in? So I did. 

Block, block, kick, flip, chop to the jugular, caught a roundhouse kick one-handed, smirk at the look on the other’s face and then sharp twist to fracture and then head first into a rubbish heap! There was another one sneaking up on me, but before I could turn around, somebody else took him out. I whirled around but the body was already on the ground. Not by an arrow but a gun, so one guess as to who gave me a helping hand.

I found his perch on a nearby rooftop easy enough. I knew he still had me sighted in his scope, so I looked up and met his eye through it, and then took a few roundabout leaps until I ended up on the ledge next to him. The Winter Soldier pulled back slightly from his rifle and looked at me flatly. It didn’t bother me much, so I smiled, winked and said, “I might have to keep you, just so you know.” (And you know you’ve got cojones when you can flirt with pretty holding a gun with blood on your face.)

The man blinked those gorgeous baby blues at me. And then did it again. And something happened to his expression, it went soft? Well, slightly. There was a little more life in his eyes and something in his shoulders relaxed, just a fraction. Then when he spoke, his voice was raspy, as if he didn’t spend much time using it. “Handlers don’t . . . they don’t flirt.”

Click: 5/5. 

“We’re going to have to talk about this, aren’t we?” I asked once I could brain again. Somehow I wasn’t certain it was healthy if he viewed me as his handler. (Wait, handler? Why?) Maybe that can be worked around? 

I would have said more but then an ear-splitting shriek rang through the air. I knew that voice, knew it all too well. “I’m have to, sorry, but I have to, I’ll be back.” I said hurriedly to Barnes before I threw myself over the ledge and raced towards the last echoes of Luna’s voice. That was not a good shriek; that was one of pure unbridled rage, the kind that didn’t come from her human throat.

 _That_ was the wrath of the dragon.

***

I made that three quarters of a mile in under ten seconds, and it only took me a further three to figure out what happened. Stark was half-sitting in the sand, bleeding from cut down the side of his face and a forming bruise around his temple, somebody apparently got him just right while his faceplate was down. Luna, having seen this or at least the aftermath, was reacting predictably. She was going full beast-mode . . . which made me the voice of reason. Fuck.

Cowering terrorists were shrieking before the vision of tiny Luna turning into a massive dragon before their eyes. The Avengers were useless in this instance. Though I suppose I could hardly blame them, it wasn’t like skyscraper-sized dragons were a thing most people knew about, or how to deal with. 

“ _ **I AM FIRE; I AM DEATH!**_ ” 

_Oh boy, she’s going full beast and murderfest._

“By the Norns,” two voices breathed, just slightly out of sync. Thor and Loki each came up on one side of me, staring up at Luna, her massive head and horns silhouetted in what were supposed to be these calm, twilight hours. 

“A real living fire drake; could you have ever imagined it, brother?”

“Never.” Great, even the two aliens were impressed by Luna about to go full murderbot. Why wasn’t I joining her? Oh yeah, complications. 

Cap was trying to help Tony to his feet and the rest of the assorted Avengers were standing around staring. _Fuck it all._ I went over to the two of them and helped get and keep Stark on his feet. I yanked a tiny flashlight from my belt and did the whole pupils check thing on the billionaire. I took it as a testament to how far gone he was that he didn’t even offer up a snarky comment. 

I couldn’t get my fingers in there to check his pulse, but I could count both the breaths he took and his heartbeat itself (I get to thank a friend of mine for teaching me how to focus that the next time I see him). I pulled a handkerchief from another pocket and dabbed lightly at the cut. (Stark was apparently back enough to take the cloth from me with a grimace and do it himself, which I suppose was good.) “The cut’s superficial and you’ve probably got a concussion. On the whole, you’re perfectly fine, but I’d almost rather you weren’t considering _her_ reaction.

“Cap, look you gotta get them out before—“ a shockwave hit and it was only through my efforts that neither man ate sand. “Shit. Look, take Stark over there,” I pointed to a spot not too far in front of Luna. “And ham the fuck up.”

“What?”

“You heard me, Tin Can. If you’ve ever played up an injury to get sympathy from a girl, well then this is the performance that needs to top all others. Be Bottom, a la _Midsummer Night's Dream_ , that’s the kind of overacting required. I mean it; you see where her head is? You gotta be loud.”

“Why can’t you get through to her?” Hawkeye coming up from my other side, and took my place keeping Stark on his feet.

“Well, a). somebody’s gotta protect them,” I indicated the assorted cowering, unconscious, or otherwise freaked out terrorists all around us (see that, bitches? Welcome to real terror!) “from her murder-rage-kill thing—Oh, when the psychopath says no to murder, you know something’s messed up. The horror!—and b). I could, but since I’m not the reason she’s in this state, it’ll take longer for anything I say to have an effect. He’s the hurt Soulmate, using him is quicker.

“Go, do the thing. The rest of you, on the plane, we’ll get the dragon to zap you all back. I gotta cleanup on aisle thirteen first.”

I think they would have kept arguing with me except that Luna roared again, and then they sped up. Even as I went to start gathering up all the conscious and unconscious terrorists, I could hear the ham in the background. “Oh the pain! The agony! I’m bleeding my life’s blood! THE PAIN!” 

***

Sometimes, I hate that dragon. Her whole murder-kill-revenge thing against the idiots who hurt one of her Soulmates was understandable, ( _We let them live and **this** is how they repay us?!_ Easy, Luna not so loud! I can hear you just fine without you trying to fry my brain!), but she told me “No killing!”—so she wasn’t allowed to either! (I was kidding . . . mostly, sorta, kinda? Well, not really, no.) 

But yeah, in truth? Mass killing would be bad, bring all kinds of attention to our involvement in this whole mess. And there was something seriously wrong with the fact that _I_ had to protect the people we were just fighting from an angry dragon. But I yanked my mask back on (because now that the fighting was over and there was a fucking _dragon_ on the loose, yeah, news crews and S.H.I.E.L.D. plus the Egyptian authorities would be here soon), pulled up my metaphorical ‘grown-up’ pants, and went to work.

It only took a few minutes before Luna realized that Stark was hollering up a storm about “The pain!” and be all, “Oh nu! The precious Tin Man!” and dropped down on her belly so she could inspect the poor injured Soulmate.

I will give Stark (and Cap since he was standing with him) props. The giant, black dragon head with the huge eye and the enormous sharp fangs suddenly appeared right next to him and he (they) managed to hold it together. Stark waved’ weakly’ and went, “Can we go home now? It hurts.” It was pitiful, and Luna, the dear, fell for it, hook, line, and sinker. 

Since Stark had her attention, I figured now would be a good time to get Luna to be practical for a few minutes. “Smaug,” I said, swinging a wide arc when I floated closer so she could see me coming, “why don’t you take the injured Stark and company back to New York? Let them get on the jet with the others, and then take them all home? I’ll clean up and make sure these twits go to prison like they’re supposed to? ( _Again/_ )

Her scaly head titled upwards to see me, and then she blew a cloud of smoke big enough to engulf me whole. I waved it away, too used to this response, “Yeah, yeah, I know, I know. But Stark kinda needs to be treated and it gets cold in the desert at night. So?”

Luna grumbled internally but she did let Cap get Stark to the jet, and then she zapped them away, presumably back to the Tower. 

***


	16. "Let me be that I am and seek not to alter to me"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rin cleans up and then returns to the Tower.
> 
> She laughs at Luna and her Soulmates and then has four important conversations squashed into one with _her_ Soulmates.
> 
> Bachi obviously caught up to her and it went as well as could be expected.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Holidays and Happy New Year to all of you still with me and those of you who have just joined me!
> 
> I think I'm just about ready to give up on apologizing for not updating regularly and for having a life and being sick and all those little details that sometimes get in the way of writing. If you're still with me from the beginning, thank you and welcome to those of you who have just made the journey. 
> 
> Hang on to your hats, its gonna be a bumpy ride!

Cleanup took just a little bit longer than anticipated and it was full dark by the time I dragged the last sniveling member of this cell-who’s-name-I-still-didn’t-know back to the ruins of their base and tied them up as a present for whoever came to collect them. I couldn’t tell if it was going to be S.H.I.E.L.D. or Interpol. I should have asked which side of the transfer they escaped on. 

What I should be doing was heading for the Tower to check on Luna and her Soulmates . . . but that mean that I’d have to have _that_ awkward conversation(s) with _my_ Soulmates. I was not prepared for this! So I was stalling. ( _Fuck my life, this day just keeps getting better and better!_ )

_Well,_ I thought, grimacing down at myself as I levitated further out into the desert to avoid being seen, _I think I’d at least like to be clean for this conversation. I’m going to need all extra motivation I can get._

_Heimdallr! Any chance I could ask for a ride home and have you **not** burn the Bifrost’s mark into the sand for all of S.H.I.E.L.D. to see? I know you can do it—otherwise we’d have been charged a lot more for damages to that hotel balcony when you dropped us that Asgardian mead. Any chance I could one day just learn to teleport and just make this easy on myself?_

Curse that man for having such a pretty voice. Even that wordless amused chuckle was oddly sexy. (I didn’t ask to be that cliché of the student with a thing for their mentor, but that damned voice!) Then with a (small) flash of light, the cold, heavy feeling of being pulled through a vacuum of space, and then I was dropped, politely, inside my penthouse. (Because no, a flash coming from the roof of a skyscraper in New York City? Yeah, bad idea.) Before I broke the connection, Heimdallr’s voice murmured an ambiguous reply to my last question. _Perhaps._

_You’re no help!_ I shot back (I cut the bastard’s laughter off short) before going to shower.

***

About an hour later, I rolled up to the Tower in my sleek Aston Martin, was waved through to the garage (I shot Jarvis a message so they knew to expect me), and headed back up the elevator for the Avengers’ floors for the second time in less than a week. “Jarvis, where’s Luna? And company?” I asked him after we exchanged pleasantries. 

“The professor, Sir, Masters Thor and Loki, and the Captain, are all in the penthouse. Shall I take you there?”

“Please.”

Jarvis got me to the top floors in good time; I thanked him, stepped out of the elevator, and then dead stopped. I took a deep breath, and then two. I will say I tried (albeit not very hard) to remain calm, but then I said ‘screw it!’ and proceeded to laugh until my ribs hurt. I did, however, muffle the sound slightly with my hand over my mouth so as not to disturb my P.L.P. (platonic life partner), who was violently cuddling (yes, I do mean violently) the ever-living-fuck out of Stark in the middle of the room, in a blanket and pillow nest, with the rest of her Soulmates. All of whom, it should be noted, had been zapped into pajamas and fuzzy socks, but had _not_ obviously been allowed to shower. So, dirty, and sweaty, but still awkwardly cuddling their grumpy Soulmate.

Four sets of eyes turned towards me and every single one shot me a look that practically screamed “Help!” When I finally got my breath back, I strolled over to the edge of the nest and peered down at them. Oh if Jarvis didn’t let me have the footage of this, I’d just die. Luna heard me approach and cracked open an eyelid to stare at me before going back to snuggling Stark (with vengeance!), murmuring nonsensically as she did.

“Might we request your assistance?” Thor inquired quietly, “The Lady Luna has been . . . most insistent of our participation in this . . . ritual of group affection and consumption of Midgardian tea.”

“It’s called cuddling, Highness, I’m pretty sure you’re familiar with the act.”

“Look, Suero, get her off me! I gotta piss!” Stark, silly, silly Stark, haven’t you figured out by now that I prefer to be asked?

“I don’t know what you lot are complaining about. She’s actually talking to you now—okay, maybe in baby-voice but still. And you’re collectively being cuddled—she’s only cuddly if she likes you. Though how she got to that conclusion, I have no idea.”

Cap tried to move Luna and vacate the nest; Luna’s head popped up and she hissed at him. Cap wisely backed down. “Some assistance would really be nice right about now.”

I waited, but the ‘please’ wasn’t coming—Thor asked, and then Stark canceled it out by being demanding, and Cap merely stated a fact, he didn’t issue a request. And I’m not actually sure why the Silver Tongue didn’t ask me—you’d think he of all people would have a basic understanding of the precision of language and the ways it can be bent. Of course, the poor attention-starved thing was more focused on the fact that while Luna was mostly cuddling Stark, because he had the nerve to get himself injured, she had one leg tangled with Loki’s—and I’m still unsure of how that position could be comfortable.

But I’m not a sadist for nothing. So I shook my head. “Maybe I’ll be back later to see if she’ll relinquish you lot. Until then, enjoy the cuddles, boys!” I turned on my heel and walked back onto the elevator, the doors closing on their shocked faces.

***

“Jarvis would you please be a dear and locate the other five members of the Avengers, please? Then could you take me to an empty living room type space where they could meet me? I kinda need to talk to them.”

“Agents Barton and Romanoff, Sergeant Barnes, Airman Wilson, and Doctor Banner are all within the Tower. The main common room might suit your needs admirably. Shall I ask them to meet you there?”

“Please do, and thank you, Jarvis.”

Jarvis dropped me at the right floor and then all I had to do was wait for the Soulmates to show up. No, I wasn’t nervous. This wasn’t going to be an awkward conversation. At all. 

Maybe Jarvis asked them extra nicely or expressed some sort of urgency in his request on my behalf because all five of them showed up at relatively the same time, even the Widow, who I was pretty certain was still pretty freaked out by the whole ‘Soulmate!’ thing, even if she’d likely never admit it. 

She and Barnes had neutral expressions walking in and even after they found places to arrange themselves. I got big smiles from Clint and Wilson (I was pretty sure I could call him Sam, but I hadn’t asked yet), and even a small one from Bruce. They found more comfortable places to actually sit (which was good because we might be here for a bit). I savored those expressions for a long moment, after this, who knew when I’d see them again?

But, right, show time. Big opener? “Hi.” _By Ra’s left ear! I’m so awkward!_ “Thank you all for coming to have this little chat with me. I know this is weird, but bear with me, there are things I need to discuss with you all. There’s really no polite way to get into this, so the reason you’re all here: I’ve got five sets of Words on my body, and there’s five of you. So yeah, Soulmates meet Soulmates.”

Cue the odd looks shot across the room and the raised eyebrows at each other and at me. “Yes, all five of you. Yes, I’m sure. No, I’m not stripping off so all of you can see your Words right now; I have other things that need to be said.”

“Hey, while I’m sure we appreciate the heads up about the whole other Soulmates and ‘the who’ questions, but, you don’t need to make this a production. There’s no need to be formal about this.” Clint said, still smiling, “So we’ve got to share; I’m pretty sure we’ll do a better job than those idiots upstairs.”

“That may be so, but actually this whole thing needs to be done. I have things I need to say and I felt it was better to wait until I knew who all of you were so I only had to have _this_ conversation once. I recognize that Fate made a decision when they handed the Words out, but Words are no guarantee of happiness or even compatibility. And because I believe in fully informed consent,” that got me a nod and an encouraging smile from Wilson (bless that man), “there are things you need to know, about me, before we go diving head first into the whole ‘we’re Soulmates’ thing. So please, just let me get through them?”

More odd looks and nods, even a very tiny one from Barnes, but I could hear them; they all thought I was being, well, ridiculous, though most of them were using more polite language. (Except Romanoff, she was totally on board using the term ‘ridiculous’ for my behavior.)

“I’ll start with the easy one first: per the whole ‘S.H.I.E.L.D. is Hydra’ thing and the info dump on the internet, I, being a hacker, hacked into S.H.I.E.L.D. and read all your files. Also in the effort of full disclosure, I am one of six individuals or organizations who managed to download a full copy, or a significant chuck, of _all_ S.H.I.E.L.D.’s dirty laundry. Stark’s got one of the other full copies; the C.I.A. got about fifty percent and Homeland got about thirty; the F.B.I. has about forty percent; MI-6 got something like thirty percent as well. The Chinese and the Russians have perhaps twenty-two percent a piece and the internet itself has so far managed to pick apart and trend eight percent. 

“Now, post dump, I’ve hacked into the new S.H.I.E.L.D. several times and seen the updated files. So that’s thing. If you need me to apologize for that invasion of privacy I will. 

“Now then, the next two things; I’ve technically admitted to both already, at different times, but they probably need to be said out loud. I am asexual, a person not desiring sexual relations with any person based on gender or genitals. So somewhere down the line I’m probably going to ask if we’re gonna be kissing, well, romantic, or platonic Soulmates—I’d be cool with either, I just have to know.

“Going from that, something you might technically know because Stark knew and he can’t keep his mouth shut, but, I’m kinky. I bit Luna in public just to piss Stark off so, if that doesn’t tell you much about my preferences, then we might have to have a conversation about that later. Also! Because this needs to be said, just because I am, does not automatically mean that I will approach a relationship with any of you with that expectation. That would require further conversations.

“Next.” Holy crap, I was getting wide-eyed stares. This was a lot of information dump and I wasn’t even done yet. I should really be breaking off and letting them process this all before I dropped the next bombshell on them, but no, I was on a roll and I was _not_ , repeat _not_ having this conversation again. 

“Right, well, ummm, also in the spirit of full disclosure, I have to tell you that I am in what I can only deem as a peculiar set of ‘intimate’ relationships—please note the word choice, these are not sexual or particularly romantic relationships—but I am in them, and I’m not quite prepared to give them up because I certainly wasn’t expecting to meet any of you anytime soon, and so that isn’t exactly fair to them. _But_ you are my Soulmates and therefor also have a right to know about them, because otherwise that wouldn’t be fair to you. So polyamory or maybe multiamory, depending on if you object to the mixing of the root languages, having many loves or relationships. This also probably requires conversations, especially if any of you are involved or wish to be involved with another person. Oh, we’re gonna have to do so much talking.

“But lastly, I think, the part that’s going to be the most difficult to swallow. Alright, I can say it, I can tell you. You kinda have to know. I’m a mutant. I’m a telekinetic, which is why shit moves on its own around me, it’s also how I ‘fly’, well, levitate—yes there’s a difference. Oh, and I’m a telepath.”

“You’re a what?!” There it was; I just knew that of all the things I had to say that this would be the kicker. Considering who my Soulmates were? Yeah, I knew going in that this was not going to go well, but they deserved to know going in, that was pretty much the point of consent culture. 

“I said I was a mutant whose abilities included telekinesis and telepathy.”

“You can muck with people’s heads?! Mess them up?! Are you doing it right now?!” Yep, as predicted, all of them were now looking at me like that, half horror and revulsion and a whole bunch of other things all mixed in. And Clint, for reasons being obvious was being (currently) the most vocal about it.

“I’m not messing with anyone’s head—“

“But you could! Are you listening?! Eavesdropping inside people’s brains!? What are you?”

“I am what I ended up being. I certainly didn’t ask to be this way. The capability of doing something doesn’t mean that a person will do it.” I was trying to be neutral about this, I really was, because getting defensive and turning this into a screaming match did none of us any good. 

“Tch.” _That_ derisive tongue click came from Romanoff. She was also obviously not okay with this revelation, after all, if the Black Widow program wasn’t about brainwashing and conditioning, I don’t know what was.

Barnes was sitting there, suddenly tense but his face was blank as stone, which could be more attributed to his not being fully recovered from his seventy-something years of brainwashing—if anyone in the Universe was listening, I’ve got to ask: who’s brilliant idea was it to give such damaged souls a telepath for a Soulmate? Specifically these people who would _not_ be okay with anyone going anywhere near their heads?

Even Bruce and Wilson were frowning and looking all together displeased. Remember oh so many hours ago I said that this was a bad day? Yeah, this whole debacle just confirmed it. 

I stood up . . . and they all recoiled, even Natasha Romanoff. I normally would have taken it in stride, my ‘not possessing a heart or feelings’ thing that I’ve had so many years to get used to it after all, but this? Even I had to admit that that . . . was unpleasant. I took a slow, deep breath and exhaled. “You can believe what you like. This was a lot of information to process at once. I apologize for dumping it all on you at once, that wasn’t . . . fair of me. But since you don’t appear to be listening to me, or even _willing_ to listen, I think we’re done here. I am going upstairs to see Luna and her Soulmates, then I am returning to the elevator, to the garage, into my car, and gone. I am informing you thusly so you can avoid me, if you wish.”

I took several careful steps backwards and exited the room via a wide arc around the still staring, if not outright glaring, Soulmates. But not even leaving the room could stop the flood of thoughts that bombarded me for all my attempts to shut them out. Had I been a weaker woman or a less experienced telepath, I think I should have broken down and wept. Pity I am what I am though, a good cry might have been the type of emotional catharsis that would have helped.

As it was, my steps were unsteady in a way I was going to blame on my shoes, and my eyes, from what I could see reflected in the walls of the elevator, were cold and dry, even more so than usual. Fuck. This was turning into a ‘Danger Night’ and it was barely even afternoon in NYC.

The doors of the elevator opened and I stepped back into the penthouse and across the floor to stand over Luna and company’s nest. Her four Soulmates looked up at me, their expressions still stuck between “Halp!” and “What’s going on here?” and “Soulmate!” but their expressions quickly changed into apprehensive or even outright concerned, which told me that whatever my face was doing, was obviously worrisome. 

“You’ve got eleven minutes,” I told them, which puzzled them even more until I turned my attention to the still aggressively cuddling Luna in the center. 

“Luna,” I said, purposely dropping my voice into something sad and plaintive. (By Amaterasu’s reflection, I should have been an actress!) The woman in question cracked an eye open and peered up at me, “I told them the truth and they were so angry. They don’t like me anymore, Luna!” 

Already prone to softness by her possessiveness and protectiveness of the ‘the precious Tin Man’ and other Soulmates, Luna heard me being ‘sad’ (as obviously an act as it was) and acted predictably. She released her hold on Stark and leaped from her nest to wrap herself bodily around me more like an octopus than a dragon. Years of practice meant I was also used to _this_ reaction and didn’t even stagger under her weight.

I glared at her confused Soulmates over Luna’s shoulder. “Ten minutes and counting before I get tired of this.” I said, my voice in normal range once more. “If you hurry, you should be able to get a shower in as well as trip to the lav. After that, when I put her down, she’s going to come looking for you all and she’s not going to be particular about where she zaps you away from to return to the nest.”

I stepped past their gobsmacked faces and into the next itself where I sat down in the center, Luna still attached to me like a limpet. I patted her lightly on the back and she released a stream of nonsensical mutterings that basically translated into “There, there.”

“And what, pray tell, did you tell our comrades that would cause them anger and you such grief?” Thor asked me, even as all four of them got to their feet and made their way towards the elevator, more slowly than I appreciated given the trouble I was going to on their behalf. Of course, they were also eying Luna to ensure that she would in fact let them go. 

I clicked my tongue behind my teeth and made a face. “I told them all the things about me they needed to know before we attempted to do the traditional Soulmate stuff. And it was all going fine until I told them I was a mutant, with abilities that included telekinesis and telepathy.”

“What?!” What is it with these boys and their penchant for that word? But it was Loki who had my attention; he’d returned to the nest and was leaning over to stare at me. “You’re what?” he asked, his eyes intent on mine. 

Needless to say I was less that impressed and I let it show. “I am one who speaks mind to mind.”

“A Mind Speaker,” he said, his thoughts turning over upon themselves in his excitement, his eyes and his expression conveying his (poorly concealed, to me at least) awe. Well, I suppose I was glad to have one fan among the Avengers—even if things could be patched up between me and mine, Luna might share the Soulmates if I asked nicely. We’re used to sharing, though I suppose putting the two of us with psychopathic tendencies together was probably one of those ‘not a good’ ideas (not that I really cared).

But now wasn’t the time or the place for those thoughts. “Ten minutes, boys.” I reminded them and was pleased when they responded with alacrity this time, even if Thor had to come over and drag his (adopted) brother away, both sporting mutual expressions of wonder. (So maybe two fans?) I continued to stroke Luna’s back as she ‘consoled’ me, and plotted about what I’d do to make my no good, horrible, very bad day better.

_Blood would do it._  
Yes.   
Blood will do nicely. 

**Author's Note:**

> 1) Posts new chapter  
> 2) Twiddles thumbs and hits refresh  
> 3) Waits for reaction  
> 4) *crickets*  
> 5) *author sighs*
> 
> I don't bite . . . without permission, honest! I have no life, so I'll always reply. Feed the authors ego!
> 
> As always, if you haven't checked out LunaDraconis' version yet, please do so. http://archiveofourown.org/works/6745789#main


End file.
